Singapore startups trying to buck the greenback with SGD stablecoins

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Hi there,

Change is afoot in the Singapore stablecoin landscape. The most obvious one is a leadership transition at StraitsX, issuer of the fiat-backed XSGD and the poster boy for regulatory compliance. Today’s the last day for co-founder Aymeric Salley, who’s starting a new job on Monday. He’s keeping the new role a surprise – not even his colleagues know.

Kenny Chan, former head of corporate strategy at Grab, will take up the mantle. He has spent 9 months warming up as the head of strategy at StraitsX’s parent company, Fazz.

None of this may matter in the near future if the Bank of International Settlements has its way. The global banking regulator plans to stamp out stablecoins, leaving room only for its cousins – deposit tokens and central bank digital currencies.

These are exciting times for Chan, who’s going to slay it on his first day at work. 💪 For the rest of us, this week’s premium story gives some insight on how he’s going to navigate StraitsX in these choppy waters.

— Shihan

🤿 THE DEEP DIVE

Singapore stablecoins to gain market share as “last-mile” settlement product

Image credit: Timmy Loen

StraitsX started out as an e-wallet company before moving on to e-money. The company’s XSGD stablecoin, issued under its e-money license, is e-money minted on blockchain. Simply, XSGD is backed 1:1 with the Singapore dollar – nothing fancy.

XSGD is currently the second largest non-US dollar stablecoin in the market after Stasis Euro. Incoming boss Kenny Chan is cognizant of XGSD’s limitations: It will never challenge the dominance of USD Coin (USDC) or Tether (USDT). XSGD’s growth, however, will be driven by solving pertinent problems related to last-mile settlement, domestic payments, and “programmable money.”

I spoke to both Chan and Aymeric Salley, the outgoing head of StraitsX, to find out where the company is headed. This is the third story in an ongoing series about non-US dollar stablecoins. Read about their yen-pegged counterparts, as well as Australian dollar stablecoins and deposit tokens in the links.

👀 ALL EYES ON…

What everyone’s talking about.

1️⃣ All cryptocurrencies except bitcoin are securities, SEC chair says. Crypto lawyers disagree.
Gary Gensler, chair of the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) was grilled on his relationship with FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried and Gensler’s plans to be the de-facto regulator for the crypto industry. His view of SEC’s remit is straightforward: the agency should have oversight over all crypto transactions except spot transactions in Bitcoin and the use of crypto tokens for payment.

⭐ TO THE STARS

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