Business briefing — October 23, 2026.

HSBC rolls out Hong Kong dollar stablecoin through PayMe

HSBC began a phased rollout of its HKD-backed RedCoin on October 23 through PayMe, whose app has more than 3.3 million users and a network of about 100,000 merchants. The bank says the stablecoin will initially support person-to-person transfers and payments at participating merchants, with integration into its Hong Kong mobile banking app planned before the end of 2026. HSBC has not disclosed the underlying blockchain or whether RedCoin can be transferred to external wallets.

What changed RedCoin has moved from a roughly 100-employee internal trial to public deployment, shifting the test from staff experience to customer use.

Why it matters Participating merchants can accept the new payment instrument without an immediate change to settlement timing; the launch does not yet offer them faster settlement.

What to watch next HSBC plans mobile-banking integration before the end of 2026, extending RedCoin from payments to purchases of tokenised investments.

Robinhood wins Dubai approval for planned 2027 retail investment launch

Robinhood received authorization from Dubai’s DFSA to arrange investment transactions and provide custody across recognized asset classes including cryptocurrencies, equities, ETFs and options. The company plans to establish its regional headquarters in the Dubai International Financial Centre and launch its product suite in 2027, but has not announced an exact date or initial customer eligibility. The approval is a DFSA authorization, not a VARA cryptocurrency-exchange licence, and does not grant unrestricted access across the Middle East.

Why it matters For prospective customers outside Dubai, the approval is not a guarantee of access: separate national rules still constrain Robinhood’s regional expansion.

What to watch next A 2027 launch is planned, but initial customer eligibility and the supported cryptocurrency list remain unresolved.

About 70% of Micron’s Taoyuan union members reject profit-sharing offer

Micron’s Taoyuan union said about 70% of its more than 2,300 members voted against the company’s profit-sharing plan, while maintaining its demand for a quarterly pool equal to 15% of operating profit. Talks scheduled for October 23 were postponed to October 27 because of Typhoon Champi; the union’s strike mandate remains in place, though the report says the symbolic action did not disrupt production. Micron’s shares closed Thursday at $856.49, down 6.3% amid a broader memory-sector selloff, according to the report.

What changed Micron added a global quarterly bonus and Taiwan benefit increases to September’s package, but roughly seven in ten union members still rejected the offer.

Why it matters For Taoyuan workers, the dispute concerns how future bonuses are calculated, not just their size: Micron’s capital-spending deduction could reduce the pool during expansion, unlike the union’s requested operating-profit formula.

What to watch next Talks are rescheduled for October 27 at Taoyuan City Government. Whether they resolve the dispute remains open.

AvaTrade Japan confirms unauthorized customer-account trades after third-party security incidents

AvaTrade Japan confirmed that unauthorized parties accessed some customer accounts and executed trades involving customers using external services, including VPS providers. The broker said it has found no evidence that credentials or personal information were leaked from its own systems, but has not disclosed the number of affected accounts, customer losses or how disputed trades will be handled. The company has not established that its incident was directly connected to the GMO Internet attack, which potentially affected 26,739 servers.

What changed The October 9 warning concerned attempted access using externally exposed credentials; the latest notice confirms that intruders also executed trades.

Why it matters Affected customers face more than an account-security problem: restoring access does not settle the financial consequences of trades already executed, while losses and reimbursement remain undetermined.

What to watch next The unresolved customer issue is whether disputed trades will be reversed or compensated. AvaTrade has not set a reimbursement policy or claims deadline.

Ethereum developers delay Hoodi testnet upgrade over smart-contract compatibility concerns

Ethereum developers postponed the Glamsterdam upgrade on the Hoodi testnet after concerns that proposed gas-accounting changes could affect contracts already deployed on mainnet. The Ethereum Foundation said further investigation is needed into EIP-8037, after ChainSecurity identified 13 real-world contracts that could be affected under certain conditions; no mainnet exploit was reported. No replacement Hoodi activation date has been announced, and the mainnet upgrade remains unscheduled.

What changed Hoodi’s upgrade and increase to a 200-million gas limit were removed from the scheduled configuration, replacing a defined activation with an open-ended delay.

Why it matters Developers of withdrawal, retry and batch-processing applications may need compatibility work before activation; the 13 identified examples put existing applications, not just future designs, in scope.

What to watch next An updated Hoodi schedule is expected after further investigation of EIP-8037; no replacement activation date is confirmed.

Fomo’s creator-driven marketing scaled user acquisition before paid ads began

Fomo’s co-founders said user-generated-content creators once referred about half of the crypto app’s users, a share they estimated had since fallen to roughly 15%; a co-founder cited monthly spending of about $100,000 to $150,000 on creators and content managers. The report says Meta’s Ad Library shows Fomo’s own paid ads beginning on September 21, after the company had described its growth as organic and said it had not run paid ads. It also found that 25 of 42 YouTube video descriptions containing Fomo referral links lacked disclosure wording, while noting that disclosure rules can make advertisers liable for deceptive endorsements.

What changed Creator referrals fell from an estimated half of users to roughly 15%, according to a co-founder; that shows a smaller acquisition share, not necessarily fewer referred users in absolute terms.

Why it matters For Fomo, treating creator acquisition as separate from paid ads does not by itself remove endorsement-compliance exposure: paid relationships can trigger disclosure obligations, and advertisers may bear liability. This is a risk, not a finding of a violation.