Animoca President Evan Auyang: Blockchain Should Be Like a Bus
Fortune published an interview with Evan Auyang, President of Animoca Brands, stating that his background is not typical for a Hong Kong Web3 startup executive: Citigroup derivatives structuring and sales, McKinsey partner, Deputy Managing Director of Kowloon Motor Bus, then Managing Director of GLG International, and appointed President of Animoca Group in October 2021.
Auyang compares buses to blockchain: reducing the cost for everyone to reach their destination, deployable on any route, and not requiring each route to be profitable individually. He explains this as the reason for his entry into crypto, promoting stablecoins, and why he believes the industry's future is closer to regulated, usable public transport. He clearly states that he does not aim to create the next Tether, but rather to establish a regulated framework to bring Greater China and local capital markets on-chain.
Animoca, Standard Chartered Bank, and Hong Kong Telecom announced a joint venture, Anchorpoint, in February 2025, becoming one of the first applicants after Hong Kong opened stablecoin license applications. The company, co-founded by Executive Chairman Yat Siu, has a portfolio of over 600 companies, recently shifting its focus to agent-based AI and on-chain intersections, claiming about one-third of its invested companies have "no fixed place of registration." Auyang also serves as an independent non-executive director at Sun Hung Kai Properties and Asia Financial Group, chairs the think tank Civic Exchange, and is on the board of the Ras Al Khaimah Innovation City Authority in the UAE.
Bus franchises sell network effects and licenses, while stablecoin joint ventures sell compliant clearing frameworks. Funding is shifting from gaming and NFT combinations to licensed fiat token and institutional Web3. Beneficiaries are local capital market participants needing HKD stablecoins and banking channels; pressured parties are unlicensed issuers using USD stablecoins for Asian settlements. The interview is a narrative event, not a license approval.
Source: Public Information
ABAB AI Insight
Auyang's path is typical of cross-industry management in Hong Kong: Brown economics and politics, Kellogg MBA, Citigroup derivatives, McKinsey Greater China infrastructure and energy consulting, then entering the Kowloon Motor Bus with millions of passengers. The parent company of Kowloon Motor Bus, KMB, is a listed company, and the deputy managing director is responsible for regulated network scheduling, not token design. Yat Siu met him through the Young Presidents' Organization and in 2021 handed over operational rights to someone who could communicate with the government, banks, and think tanks to position Animoca from a game publisher to digital property and institutional framework.
The capital path is through licensed joint ventures. Standard Chartered provides banking and custody credibility, telecom provides accounts and communication layers, and Animoca provides Web3 distribution and portfolio. If the HKD stablecoin obtains a license, pricing power shifts from offshore USD stablecoins to licensed local frameworks. At the same time, shifting real gold towards agent-based AI acknowledges that gaming on-chain has not consumed mass payments; the clearing layer must have license rents.
Benchmarking Singapore's use of bank licenses to incubate stablecoins, Dubai's use of free trade zones to stack exchanges, and Circle's use of USD reserves for global settlements. Animoca is transitioning from Sandbox-like consumer applications to "institutional Web3," with NEOM data governance and HKD stablecoins being part of the same product for government discussions. The key point of the bus metaphor is: public transport can lose on individual routes, but the network itself is protected by a franchise.
Structural changes belong to regulatory changes. Hong Kong's stablecoin regulations bring issuance rights into licensed entities, and the bus narrative defends the franchise: it does not require every on-chain application to be profitable, but requires the framework to be legal first. Whoever obtains the local fiat token license first will set the price for on-chain settlements in the Greater China capital market. Unlicensed USD coins can still circulate, but institutional funds will be pushed towards licensed frameworks by regulations.
ABAB News · Law of Cognition
Public transport can lose on routes, but the framework must have a license
Stablecoins do not pursue market cap first, but clearing rights
Those who can schedule buses are invited to schedule licenses