Background
Hong Kong granted eight virtual-bank licences in 2019, a deliberate move to widen retail competition in a market long held by HSBC, Standard Chartered and BOCHK. livi was in that first cohort, authorised by the HKMA in 2019 and open to the public in August 2020. In October 2024 the HKMA dropped the “virtual bank” label and renamed the category “digital bank”, on the view that the old Chinese term implied something fictional; the licence and prudential treatment were unchanged.
Concept
livi bank (formerly livi VB Limited) is Bank of China (Hong Kong)'s entry in Hong Kong's digital-bank cohort — a joint venture owned 44% by BOC Hong Kong (Holdings), 36% by JD Technology (Jingdong Digits) and 20% by the Jardine Matheson Group, capitalised with about HK$2.5 billion at launch. The ownership is the positioning: a state-linked Chinese clearing bank for rails and trust, a mainland e-commerce group for technology and reach, and a historic Hong Kong house for local standing. Deposits are protected under Hong Kong's Deposit Protection Scheme up to HK$800,000 per depositor.
Personal accounts run in HKD, CNY and USD, with time deposits in all three, no minimum balance and no monthly fee. livi Business is a separate product for Hong Kong-incorporated companies, also with no minimum balance and corporate time deposits from HK$500 to HK$10 million. One constraint defines who it suits: business accounts do not send cross-border transfers over RTGS or SWIFT. Instant international movement is a personal-account feature — USD over RTGS through BOCHK — so a company with real cross-border flows still needs a second bank.
🍓 livi fits Hong Kong personal clients with USD flows or CNY settlement into mainland China — instant retail cross-border USD over RTGS is rare among digital banks — and small local businesses on a HK company that do not move money across borders. For corporate SWIFT or RTGS, pair it with ZA Bank.
Use cases
Personal USD transfers over RTGS. Through BOCHK, livi gives retail clients fast USD settlement over Real-Time Gross Settlement — uncommon in the digital-bank segment — and routes CNY into mainland China through BOCHK correspondents without extra charges.
Local HKD and CNY business payments. livi Business clients get instant HKD and CNY transfers inside Hong Kong and into the mainland over BOCHK rails, plus credit decisions in about one business day. What they do not get is cross-border SWIFT or RTGS on the business account — the line that separates livi from ZA Business or Airstar Business.
livi Business as a treasury tool. Onboarding is fully online with approval as fast as one day; the app handles payments, payroll and expense tracking, and SME financing through the livi Business Instalment Loan. For a Hong Kong operating company it is faster than the incumbents, subject to the cross-border caveat above.
Everyday personal banking. A multi-currency wallet, a debit card and liviSave savings at preferential rates with no minimum — the retail core that funds the rest of the franchise.
Who livi is not suitable for
- Non-residents of Hong Kong with a company but no local address and no HKID beneficiary — livi requires at least one director with HKID.
- Large international SWIFT activity outside the US and mainland China — a traditional bank such as HSBC Hong Kong or Standard Chartered Hong Kong remains the better fit.
- Russians and Belarusians without HKID or residency in another country — like all HK virtual banks, strict KYC.
Regulation and deposit protection
A digital bank is a fully licensed bank, supervised by the HKMA under the same Banking Ordinance regime as the incumbents — not a stored-value wallet or a money-service operator. Deposits sit under the Deposit Protection Scheme, whose limit rose from HK$500,000 to HK$800,000 per depositor per bank on 1 October 2024. The practical difference from a branch bank is the missing branch network; the legal claim on your deposit is the same.
Where livi fits in a cross-border setup
For a family relocating to Hong Kong or running a holding company there, livi is a quick online account for everyday HKD, CNY and USD — opened from the app while slower onboarding at a traditional Hong Kong bank runs in parallel. The usual pairing is livi for daily flows and China settlement, a global bank for SWIFT, and, where the structure justifies it, a profits-tax-exempt investment holding vehicle on top. It is one building block in a Hong Kong plan and rarely the entire banking stack.
Evolution
livi has moved beyond deposits. It added SME lending, piloted wealth management in 2023, and tested a buy-now-pay-later product, livi PayLater, since withdrawn. The deposit base reached roughly HK$3.5 billion by 2025 as the bank pushed into investments and insurance distribution, and in December 2025 it added “Money Safe”, a self-imposed lock that holds part of a balance — at least HK$10,000 — out of reach of scam transfers. The path mirrors the cohort: open with high-rate deposits, then chase fee income in lending and wealth to reach profitability.
Related topics
- Opening a bank account in Hong Kong
- Airstar Bank — Xiaomi-backed digital bank
- ZA Bank — Hong Kong's largest digital bank by deposits
- Fusion Bank — Tencent / WeChat ecosystem
- Ant Bank — Ant Group / Alipay, cross-border with the mainland
- Mox Bank — Standard Chartered's digital bank
- WeLab Bank — Hong Kong's homegrown digital bank
- PAO Bank — Ping An OneConnect for SMEs
- Hong Kong digital-bank licensing: neobank, neobank and the banking boundary