Singapore, Hong Kong, Dubai.
In the global chess game of the crypto industry, the three cities are competing for the right to speak in the industry and talent resources in different ways.
Singapore's strict supervision has made the former utopia fade away, Hong Kong's policy openness has set off a wave of return, and Dubai has become an emerging crypto oasis with the model of "zero tax burden + open supervision".
These three crypto highlands are all dream habitats for the crypto industry, but now they are standing at the crossroads of fate. Who will have the last laugh in this "Three Cities Tale" with an iron fist of supervision, capital flow, and Web3 ambitions?
Singapore, the island known as the "Lion City", was once a utopia in the eyes of countless crypto dreamers.
Today, the Singapore crypto circle is shrouded in a "compliance fog".
In June 2025, the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) issued a final interpretation requiring unlicensed digital token service providers (DTSPs) to stop providing services to overseas customers by June 30, and even the core team's overseas projects in Singapore must be subject to MAS's regulatory review.
The policy is still unclear, and people are panicking for a while.
Since then, Singapore's MAS has adopted a combination of soft and hard tactics, appeasing and being tough on offshore exchanges.
MAS issued the latest explanation that the main objects of regulation are so-called digital payment tokens and tokens of capital market products, that is, payment tokens or equity tokens. For service providers of governance tokens and utility and governance tokens, they are not affected by the regulations and do not need to apply for a license.
In addition, according to Bloomberg, Singapore regulators issued a final warning, urging major cryptocurrency trading platforms operating in the country but not holding local licenses to withdraw quickly.
According to TechFlow,Many crypto exchanges based in Singapore have begun evacuation plans, moving core personnel to Hong Kong, Malaysia and other places.
However, long before the policy panic, crypto practitioners fleeing Singapore was already a trend.
"It's too expensive, I can't afford it", even senior crypto practitioner XIN feels that the cost of living in Singapore is too high.
"A better apartment in Orchard Road costs about 5,000 Singapore dollars (25,000 RMB), and this cost alone is a headache for many people, but more importantly, it's much harder to make money this year."
In the eyes of Adam, a crypto practitioner, Singapore has attracted a large number of practitioners in the past. On the one hand, Singapore is safe and institutionally guaranteed. On the other hand, everyone can make money and cover costs. Whether it is the project party, the exchange or the VC, they can all get a share of the bull market. However, this cycle seems to belong only to Bitcoin. A large number of altcoin projects have broken their issue prices, and crypto VCs have lost all their money. It is better to hoard Bitcoin and lie flat than to toss hard. Staying in Singapore has lost its meaning except for increasing costs.
Qin, who has lived in Singapore for several years, has also observed that more and more people in the industry have left Singapore in the past year. An obvious phenomenon is that many of the previously active Singapore hiking groups have become silent.
With the impact of this policy, many practitioners will leave one after another. So who will continue to stay in Singapore?
First, practitioners of crypto licensed companies. According to the official website of Singapore Mas, 24 companies including COBO, ANTALPHA, CEFFU, MATRIXPORT are on the exemption list, and 33 companies including BITGO, CIRCLE, COINBASE, GSR, Hashkey, OKX SG have obtained DTSP licenses.
Second, practitioners who do not require licensing, such as crypto VC, KOL, non-securities and payment token project parties... However, most of the above personnel are founders and executives, or practitioners who have obtained Singapore PR and settled in Singapore.
In summary, Singapore has implemented their talent strategy to attract people who are sufficiently compliant and high net worth.
Leaving Singapore, where is the new hot spot for encryption?
Hong Kong and Dubai may be the two major versions of the answer at present.
After the final interpretation of Singapore's DTSP was announced, Hong Kong Legislative Council member Wu Jiezhuang immediately issued a bilingual statement in Chinese and English on social media:"If you are unable to continue to develop in Singapore and intend to move to Hong Kong, please contact me to learn about the relevant situation. We are willing to provide assistance and welcome to develop in Hong Kong!"
The night view of Victoria Harbour is still dazzling, but Hong Kong's financial story is ushering in a new chapter.
With the listing of Circle, Hong Kong's promotion of stablecoin supervision has brought the attention of various capitals back to the Lion Rock.
On May 21, 2025, the Hong Kong Stablecoin Issuer Bill was officially passed, requiring stablecoin issuers to be licensed and reserve assets to be 100% backed by highly liquid assets. The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) even has extraterritorial jurisdiction to supervise global Hong Kong dollar-pegged stablecoins.
On June 12, according to Bloomberg, Ant Group's international department is planning to apply for a stablecoin license in Hong Kong.
In addition to the increasingly clear and clear encryption policy, Hong Kong's current macro environment is experiencing unprecedented improvement compared to the past few years when it was once ridiculed as a "financial relic."
The well-known financial media Gelonghui Gelong shared several sets of data:
1. Hong Kong's residential rental level has reached a new high;
2. The number of Americans in Hong Kong (representative data of foreigners in Hong Kong) has reached a new high. Before the epidemic, there were 85,000, and after the epidemic ended in 2023, there were only 70,000 left. Now the latest data has exceeded 85,000;
3. The application fee collected by the University of Hong Kong in one year (not admission, but application fee) has reached 800 million.
LD CAPITAL founder Yi Lihua has lived and worked in Singapore and Hong Kong for a long time, but he admits that he prefers Hong Kong and will stay in Hong Kong for a long time in the future.
"Hong Kong has many advantages, such as more delicious food, better climate, closer to the mainland, and more friendly policies. In addition, it is very important that it is easier to get an identity in Hong Kong than in Singapore. It is given after a sufficient period of stay, while Singapore requires repeated applications.Stay in China forever. I think it is a better choice for future generations to continue to be Chinese." Yi Lihua said.
More and more crypto practitioners choose to move from Singapore to Hong Kong. According to insiders, TRON founder Sun Yuchen also moved from Singapore to Hong Kong to settle down long-term.
Comparing the rise and fall of popularity in the two cities, an obvious indicator is the rental level.
According to Midland Realty data, in May 2024, Hong Kong's residential rents climbed for three consecutive months, reaching the highest level since 2019.
Hong Kong Centaline City Rent Index (CRI) showed that it was reported at 125.38 in May this year, soaring 1.32% month-on-month, the largest increase in 9 months, and only 2.05% lower than the historical high.
In contrast, in the first half of 2024, Singapore's prime private housing rents fell 4.5%, the largest drop among 30 cities in the world.
In addition to Singapore and Hong Kong in East Asia, Dubai, this "chain desert oasis", is reshaping the crypto power map at a rocket speed.
"Zero personal income tax, corporate tax as low as 0-9%, relatively reasonable cost of living, more international", a practitioner who has lived and worked in Dubai for 2 years listed the city's attractions, "More importantly, the regulators here truly understand and embrace crypto innovation."
In 2025, the Dubai Virtual Asset Regulatory Authority (VARA) further optimized the regulatory rules and adopted the "sandbox-adapt-expand" model to provide clearer legal protection for virtual asset service providers (VASPs).
As early as 2024, Dubai has gathered more than 1,400 blockchain start-ups with a total valuation of US$24.5 billion, forming a complete ecosystem including more than 90 investment funds and 12 incubators.
According to Chainalysis data, Dubai's crypto industry contributes about 100 billion dirhams (US$27.25 billion) in output value, accounting for 4.3% of the UAE's GDP.
In May 2025, the UAE state-owned investment company MGX invested $2 billion in Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange, which is an obvious signal.
Snow, a senior investor in the crypto industry, has lived in Dubai for a long time. "Many opportunities" is the core reason why she chose Dubai. In her opinion, the Middle East is not as perfect as Singapore and Hong Kong in all aspects, whether it is the legal system or the infrastructure, many are not perfect, but the more imperfect a place is, the more opportunities there are.
Dubai, like Shenzhen at the beginning of the last century, people from all over the world flocked to it, just for the original dream - to make money.
"In addition to the natives of the Middle East, the largest number of people in Dubai are Europeans, Russians, Indians, and Chinese... Everyone comes here to discuss business and make money, and then buys a house in Dubai or back home."
Nancy, who lives in Dubai, used to be a real estate agent and has been witnessing the crazy rise in Dubai's housing market. According to a recent report by CBRE, a global commercial real estate services company, Dubai's residential prices will rise by an average of 18% in 2024, and by the first quarter of 2025, this figure will reach 20%.
And the upstarts of cryptocurrency are an important force supporting Dubai's housing market.
"In the past few years, cryptocurrency tycoons from China have bought a large number of buildings in Dubai," said Nancy.
Previously, Damac Properties, Dubai's largest private real estate developer, announced that it would accept cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin to pay for the sale of real estate.
Today, Dubai is also the most important test field for real estate RWA.
On May 1, Dubai's MultiBank Group, real estate giant MAG and blockchain provider Mavryk signed a $3 billion RWA agreement that will enable MAG's luxury real estate projects to enter the blockchain through the regulated RWA market.
On May 25, the Dubai Land Department (DLD), the Central Bank of the United Arab Emirates and the Dubai Future Foundation launched a tokenized real estate project in the Middle East and North Africa. The government agencies launched a platform that allows investors to buy tokenized shares of "ready-to-own properties in Dubai."
Due to its friendly regulation, Dubai is currently the base camp for many exchanges, led by Binance, the largest cryptocurrency trading platform.
In Dubai and even the entire Middle East, Binance has a relatively special status.
"Binance is a very useful identity label in Dubai. Former employees, Binance-invested companies, Binance partners... are all very high-quality identity endorsements. Even if there are none, many people will try to get in touch with them and say that they know a certain executive of Binance," Nancy said. Perhaps it is the agglomeration effect brought by Binance that has led to Dubai becoming an important information and project resource trading center in the crypto market. A large number of shell resources and other market making of cryptocurrency projects are traded in Dubai.
In addition to exchange personnel, Dubai currently also gathers a large number of well-known crypto KOLs. For example,
The Coin Bureau studio with 2.68 million followers on YouTube is in Dubai.However, Dubai also faces its own challenges.
Extreme summer heat, cultural differences, limited banking services, and geopolitical uncertainties are all potential concerns. "Dubai is great, but it's not everyone's ideal choice," Nancy said.
"Many people just want to make money in Dubai, and leave when they make enough money. Dubai is not suitable for living. In comparison, Abu Dhabi has a more lively atmosphere."
In addition, the differences in Dubai culture and time zone may also become an obstacle to expanding into the Asian market. Dubai is a bridge connecting Europe, Asia and Africa, while Hong Kong is the gateway to Asia, especially the Chinese market.
Singapore's tightening regulations, Hong Kong's policy revival, and Dubai's rapid rise, the three crypto cities have formed a special pattern:Hong Kong is the gateway to Asia, especially the Chinese market, Dubai is the intersection of Europe, Asia and Africa, and Singapore may be repositioned as a more compliant and institutionalized crypto asset management center.
Whether it is the dazzling night view of Victoria Harbour, the magnificent landscape of the Dubai Tower, or the modern buildings of Singapore's Marina Bay, the skylines of these cities are witnessing the arrival of a new era of crypto finance.
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