China's Crypto Ban vs Hong Kong's Rules: What It Means for Games

Mainland China has banned crypto trading and mining outright since September 2021. Hong Kong has spent the same years building a licensing regime. For blockchain game companies, including Korean ones, the border matters more than ever.

The world's biggest games market has no legal place for a crypto game. Mainland China, home to Tencent and NetEase and hundreds of millions of players, has banned cryptocurrency trading and mining outright since 24 September 2021. A short train ride south, Hong Kong has spent the same period building rules to welcome digital-asset businesses.

For blockchain game companies, the result is a strange map. The market they would most like to reach is closed. The city next door is open, but with paperwork that has grown heavier every year.

Ten years of tightening on the mainland

China did not ban crypto overnight. It closed the doors one at a time:

5 December 2013: the People's Bank of China (PBOC) barred financial institutions from handling bitcoin transactions.
1 April 2014: the PBOC ordered banks and payment companies to close bitcoin trading accounts within two weeks.
September 2017: exchanges and trading platforms were effectively banned; 173 platforms had closed by July 2018.
Early 2018: authorities announced a crackdown on bitcoin mining.
24 September 2021: a complete ban on cryptocurrency trading and mining took effect.

For games, that last step settled the question. A play-to-earn game needs a token that players can sell. On the mainland, there is no legal market to sell it on.

Hong Kong's opposite turn

Hong Kong went the other way. As early as 2013, the head of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority said bitcoin was only a virtual commodity and would not be regulated by the HKMA. In late 2022, government bodies including the Treasury bureau and the HKMA announced plans to embrace digital assets and began work on a framework. A supervision framework with tougher identity checks was finalised in late 2023, and new rules for virtual asset trading platforms took effect in mid-2024.

The welcome came with conditions. From August 2025, stricter licensing rules for stablecoins took effect, and at least one Korean blockchain game company found its plans stopped by them.

Where Korean firms actually went

The same company's moves show how the regional map works in practice. In March and April 2025, Nexus set up Nexus China in Guangzhou and Nexus Hub FZCO in Dubai. A spokesperson said the company operates globally through its Dubai and China subsidiaries and plans to expand into the US, while noting that plans could change with geopolitical and regulatory conditions. Abu Dhabi was also mentioned as a possible base for stablecoin work, given its relatively friendly rules.

In other words, Korean firms that cannot sell P2E games at home (Korea's ban) are not simply moving next door. They are spreading across jurisdictions, each chosen for a different piece of the business.

What it means for games

For players, the practical meaning is simple. On the mainland, blockchain games with tradable tokens are not a legal option. In Hong Kong, the platforms where tokens trade must be licensed, and the rules are still being tightened. Token prices remain volatile everywhere.

For studios, the lesson is that "Asia" is not one market. A blockchain game can be built in Vietnam, played in the Philippines, financed from Dubai and blocked in Beijing and Seoul at the same time.

WGC's take: China's ban is the most complete in the region, and nothing we found suggests it is softening. Hong Kong is the more interesting story: a city that invited crypto in, then kept raising the bar. Whether that bar is a welcome mat or a wall for game companies depends on what kind of token they want to issue.