LexisNexis^® 40 UNDER 40 2025

Joshua Chu (朱喬華)
Lawyer & Law Lecturer, Co-Chair
Hong Kong Web3 Association

Since 2016, Joshua Chu has worked at the forefront intersection of law and technology. His career had been defined by a number of landmark first-of-their-kind cases, each of which had contributed towards Hong Kong's legal and technological advancement. These includes:

• Beginning with Hong Kong’s first crypto litigation, Joshua led the successful defense case for Bitfinex, the then world's longest running and largest crypto-exchange in 2016; 
• He then went on to contribute towards modernising civil procedure with the city’s first court order permitting digital service of legal documents via data rooms in Hwang Joon Sang & Anor v. Golden Electronics Inc. & Ors [2020] HKCFI 1084 in 2020;
• This was quickly followed by obtaining the city's first court order for digital Norwich Pharmacal (NP) disclosure, compelling third parties to reveal information via electronic means  in Hwang Joon Sang & Anor v. Golden Electronics Inc. & Ors [2021] HKCFI 544 in the following year;
• In 2023, Joshua contributed to early native tokenised bond work that advanced blockchain-based delivery of legal information.
• In 2024, he co-advocated Hong Kong's first civil action against JPEX (dubbed "Hong Kong's FTX"), a case that secured rights for investors and established how crypto wallet holders can be named as defendants.
• The same year in 2024, he led (as tech provider and expert) the development and deployment of tokenised legal documents in Worldwide A-Plus, enabling on-chain enforcement of court orders and deployed Hong Kong’s first tokenised injunction order against cold wallets, enabling on-chain asset freezes in Worldwide A-Plus, with these approaches drawing public endorsement and being referenced by the legal-tech community.

Joshua’s cross-border experience spans litigation and enforcement across South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, the British Virgin Islands, Seychelles and New York, including fraud recovery strategies and evidence gathering. He has acted as lead counsel in HKIAC arbitrations covering shareholder and technology M&A disputes with parties across Asia, Africa and Oceania, and has appeared before the WTO Review Body on Bid Challenges in Government Procurement Agreement matters. His advisory work includes assisting clients with Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission licensing, anti-money laundering controls with overseas digital-asset providers, multinational transactions with cross-Asia impact, and guidance for virtual-asset service platforms seeking licensing under Dubai’s VARA regime.

His ventures extend beyond litigation. As a senior consultant with Prosynergy, a regulatory consultancy that led the acquisition of nearly all of Hong Kong’s first batch of VATP licences, Joshua  further built upon his experience on matters of virtual asset compliance, which he now gives back to the community through his role as a lecturer on the subject at HKU SPACE. His other notable advisory work includes advising the US Consulate on complex real estate transactions. 

Committed to professional development and public discourse, Joshua co-chairs the Hong Kong Web3 Association and serves as the legal advisor to Women in Web3 Hong Kong. On the academia front, he regularly co-authors thought-leadership articles on cryptocurrency law, AI-related disputes and regulatory trends for publications such as Law.com, Asia Business Law Journal and more recently, Cointelegraph. 

His stated mission is to ensure that legal processes evolve alongside rapidly advancing technology by applying smart contracts and tokenisation to expand access to justice and reinforce investor confidence in the digital era.