NEW YORK, NY / ACCESS Newswire / September 11, 2025 / From the start, recycling was pitched as the low-cost, high-impact fix for the planet's plastic problem. And everyone played along. Governments rolled out bold targets, corporations committed vast sums, and watchdog groups pushed hard for results. Yet the outcome tells another story. Recycling rates remain flat, plastic waste continues to pile up, and confidence in the process has steadily eroded.
The problem was never a lack of effort or resources. It was that everyone was working inside a system that was flawed by design, making failure almost inevitable. That is why the announced partnership between SMX (NASDAQ:SMX) and Singapore's A*STAR is such a turning point. Together, they are unveiling the world's first national plastics passport, part of a system designed not to work around the flaws of recycling but to correct them at the foundation. What once failed because of weak design can now succeed because the structure itself is being rebuilt.
No one's pointing fingers, here. The failures of recycling were never about intent but about a system that couldn't scale. Fragmentation came first, with every country-and often every city-setting its own rules. What passed as recycled in one market could be rejected in another, leaving global companies unable to prove consistency.
Oversight was the next weakness, built on paperwork and sporadic audits that were subjective and easy to manipulate. Claims of recycled content amounted to little more than trust. Finally, the system's scope was far too narrow. By focusing mainly on bottles and food packaging while ignoring industrial polymers, automotive resins, electronics, textiles, and construction materials, recycling was bound to remain marginal instead of transformative.
That is why the creation of a plastics passport matters, and why SMX's Plastic Cycle Token (PCT) takes it further, turning proof of recycling into a verifiable, tradable asset that rewards participation across the supply chain.
Correcting The Fatal Design Flaws
Viewed together, the system flaws were not minor oversights but fatal design features. They explain why decades of investment and political will never managed to deliver the results promised. Without a redesign, recycling could never live up to its potential.
This is the context in which SMX's technology delivers something new. By embedding invisible molecular markers directly into plastics, the company creates a plastics passport that travels with the material through its entire lifecycle. The passport establishes a consistent standard that applies whether the material is recycled in Europe, Singapore, ASEAN, or the United States. It replaces fragmentation with uniformity.
Better still, because the plastics passport is embedded immutably at the material level, oversight becomes a matter of proof rather than paperwork. Regulators and companies can verify recycled content instantly and continuously, without relying on subjective audits. And because SMX's markers can be embedded in virtually any polymer, from packaging to industrial-grade plastics, the system around a circular economy standard finally expands beyond the narrow focus that doomed earlier attempts.
Singapore Steps Forward To Create The Standard
It is no surprise that Singapore is the first country to implement this vision on a national scale. The country has a track record of building frameworks that go on to shape international standards, from finance to digital infrastructure. Through A*STAR and SMX, Singapore's mission to perpetuate the world's first national plastics passport is once again setting the pace.
The ripple effects are already visible across ASEAN, where neighboring markets, with this new blueprint, see a clear path to replicate Singapore's model. Analysts estimate that the opportunity tied to a plastics passport framework in Southeast Asia could exceed S$4.2 billion annually, built on certified recycled materials and platform adoption.
The timing could not be more urgent. Governments are under pressure to prove that environmental policies create measurable results. Brands are under pressure from consumers and investors to back up sustainability claims with hard evidence. Financial markets are hunting for companies that can convert compliance into economic value.
In each case, the plastics passport offers a solution that moves recycling from aspiration to infrastructure. Waste becomes verified feedstock, compliance becomes a defensible asset, and sustainability becomes something that can be measured, traded, and trusted. For the first time, recycling has a pathway to function as promised. SMX is the company making that historic shift possible, turning proof into the currency that can finally make circularity work.
References
National Environment Agency (NEA). Waste & Recycling Statistics 2014 - 2023. Singapore: NEA; 2024.
Shunpoly.com. "How Much Plastic Is Wasted Each Year in Singapore?" Accessed 5 August 2025.
National Environment Agency (NEA). Waste-Statistics & Overall Recycling (interactive dashboard). Updated 2024; accessed 5 August 2025.
National Environment Agency (NEA). Mandatory Packaging Reporting portal. Accessed 5 August 2025.
Singapore Statutes Online. Environmental Public Health (Public Cleansing) Regulations - Incineration gate-fee schedule; revised 2024.
National Environment Agency (NEA). "New Licensing Regime for General Waste Disposal Facilities." Technical brief & dialogue-session slides; 2024.
Nasdaq.com. "SMX Announces Planned Launch of World's First Plastic Cycle Token." Press release; 2024.
Yahoo! Finance. "SMX Plastic Cycle Token Is a Functional Market-Driven Solution…" News article; 2024.
Los Angeles Tribune. "Carbon Credits Had Their Day… Now the SMX Plastic Cycle Token…" Feature article; 2025.
National Environment Agency (NEA). Refuse Collection Fees for Households. Revised 2024; accessed 5 August 2025.
About SMX
As global businesses face new and complex challenges relating to carbon neutrality and meeting new governmental and regional regulations and standards, SMX is able to offer players along the value chain access to its marking, tracking, measuring and digital platform technology to transition more successfully to a low-carbon economy.
Forward-Looking Statements
The information in this press release includes "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, statements regarding expectations, hopes, beliefs, intentions or strategies regarding the future. In addition, any statements that refer to projections, forecasts or other characterizations of future events or circumstances, including any underlying assumptions, are forward-looking statements. The words "anticipate," "believe," "contemplate," "continue," "could," "estimate," "expect," "forecast," "intends," "may," "will," "might," "plan," "possible," "potential," "predict," "project," "should," "would" and similar expressions may identify forward-looking statements, but the absence of these words does not mean that a statement is not forward-looking. Forward-looking statements in this press release may include, for example: matters relating to the Company's fight against abusive and possibly illegal trading tactics against the Company's stock; successful launch and implementation of SMX's joint projects with manufacturers and other supply chain participants of gold, steel, rubber and other materials; changes in SMX's strategy, future operations, financial position, estimated revenues and losses, projected costs, prospects and plans; SMX's ability to develop and launch new products and services, including its planned Plastic Cycle Token; SMX's ability to successfully and efficiently integrate future expansion plans and opportunities; SMX's ability to grow its business in a cost-effective manner; SMX's product development timeline and estimated research and development costs; the implementation, market acceptance and success of SMX's business model; developments and projections relating to SMX's competitors and industry; and SMX's approach and goals with respect to technology. These forward-looking statements are based on information available as of the date of this press release, and current expectations, forecasts and assumptions, and involve a number of judgments, risks and uncertainties. Accordingly, forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as representing views as of any subsequent date, and no obligation is undertaken to update forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances after the date they were made, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as may be required under applicable securities laws. As a result of a number of known and unknown risks and uncertainties, actual results or performance may be materially different from those expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. Some factors that could cause actual results to differ include: the ability to maintain the listing of the Company's shares on Nasdaq; changes in applicable laws or regulations; any lingering effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on SMX's business; the ability to implement business plans, forecasts, and other expectations, and identify and realize additional opportunities; the risk of downturns and the possibility of rapid change in the highly competitive industry in which SMX operates; the risk that SMX and its current and future collaborators are unable to successfully develop and commercialize SMX's products or services, or experience significant delays in doing so; the risk that the Company may never achieve or sustain profitability; the risk that the Company will need to raise additional capital to execute its business plan, which may not be available on acceptable terms or at all; the risk that the Company experiences difficulties in managing its growth and expanding operations; the risk that third-party suppliers and manufacturers are not able to fully and timely meet their obligations; the risk that SMX is unable to secure or protect its intellectual property; the possibility that SMX may be adversely affected by other economic, business, and/or competitive factors; and other risks and uncertainties described in SMX's filings from time to time with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
EMAIL: info@securitymattersltd.com
SOURCE: SMX (Security Matters) Public Limited
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