OKX Restricts Claude for Hong Kong Staff Even as It Markets Claude-Powered AI Tools

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• OKX has barred Hong Kong-based employees and staff traveling through mainland China from using Anthropic’s Claude, after its enterprise account was briefly suspended in early August 2026.
• The restriction follows the same move by Goldman Sachs in April and JPMorgan in June, both citing Anthropic’s Hong Kong access terms.
• OKX launched an AI-agent marketplace built on Claude Code five weeks before the account suspension, and continues to promote it.

OKX has barred Hong Kong-based staff, and employees traveling through mainland China, from using Claude, after its enterprise Claude account was briefly suspended in early August. The account has since been restored. “We recently became aware that access to Claude by certain OKX employees based in Hong Kong may not have been fully aligned with Anthropic’s geographic access policies,” the company said.

Anthropic’s Geographic Rules Put OKX in a Growing Group

Anthropic’s terms bar Claude from mainland China and Hong Kong outright, and a September 2025 update extended that to any company more than 50% owned by a firm headquartered in an unsupported region, wherever the subsidiary operates. OKX is the third major financial firm this year caught by it:

• Goldman Sachs cut Claude access for its Hong Kong bankers in April, after a strict reading of its contract.
• Anthropic said at the time Claude “had never been officially ‘supported’ in Hong Kong.”
• JPMorgan followed in June, dropping Claude from its approved tools for Hong Kong staff over the same terms.

OKX’s Claude-Powered AI Strategy Continues Despite the Restriction

The restriction sits awkwardly next to OKX’s own AI ambitions. On June 30, weeks before the suspension, OKX launched OKX AI, a marketplace where agents hire each other, transact in stablecoins, and build on-chain reputations, built to work with Claude Code. The launch marked a broader push into AI-powered crypto and Web3 tools.

CEO Star Xu said “the coming decade will be defined by one-person companies that generate over a million dollars in annual revenue.” OKX also released an open-source Agent Trade Kit linking AI agents, including Claude-based ones, to its trading infrastructure, alongside OKX Ventures’ $53 million stake in Coinone.

• None of that product strategy has changed since the restriction took effect.
• OKX still builds its business around Claude-compatible tools for outside users while its own Hong Kong staff can’t log into Claude.

The restriction is a fix to who has a seat on OKX’s enterprise account, not a retreat from Claude as a product. OKX’s card spending growth in Europe is another front in its consumer expansion.

OKX and Anthropic Face Broader Compliance Pressure

OKX has a track record of compliance trouble at scale: over $500 million paid to the DOJ last year for anti-money-laundering violations, and a €2.6 million fine in the Netherlands for unregistered operation.

Anthropic is under its own pressure, telling investors on August 17 that its revenue run rate passed $65 billion in July, up from $9 billion at end-2025, ahead of a fall IPO. It doubled Claude Code’s rate limits in May after a SpaceX compute deal.

In June, Washington ordered Anthropic to suspend its Fable 5 and Mythos 5 models for foreign nationals worldwide, citing a potential jailbreak.

• Anthropic complied but pushed back, saying the finding shouldn’t justify recalling a model used by hundreds of millions.
• Washington lifted the order weeks later.

Both episodes point to the same conclusion: for a company nearing a public listing, who uses Claude, and where, is now a live question. This also comes as OKX advances its U.S. strategy. Whether OKX’s restriction stays internal, or reaches the Claude tools it sells outside users, is worth watching next.