Hong Kong is working to scale up the London Metal Exchange (LME)-approved warehouses' metal storage to a hundred-thousand-ton level, said Matthew Chamberlain, chief executive at the LME, a subsidiary of Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited (0388).
Chamberlain said at the LME Asia Metals Seminar 2026 that the current challenge is a lack of warehousing space, as Hong Kong now has only 10,000 tons of storage capacity.
He said the city's LME trading volume last year surpassed the previous peak set in 2014, and reached a new high in January this year, driven primarily by mainland Chinese investment activity. Stimulated by geopolitical turmoil, trading volumes in March and April also ranked second- and third-highest on record, respectively.
Chamberlain noted that Hong Kong's approved warehouse network has grown rapidly, from four warehouses last year to 15 today, with seven operators storing nearly 25,000 metric tons of metal, underscoring Hong Kong's growing position as a non-ferrous metals hub.
Additionally, he said the LME is studying how to leverage Hong Kong's advantages in the digital assets market to promote the tokenization of physical assets.
𝗗𝗼𝘄𝗻𝗹𝗼𝗮𝗱 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗻𝗱𝗮𝗿𝗱 𝗔𝗽𝗽 ↓
