Want China Times, Lai Chao-nan and Staff Reporter, 2015-06-27
 |
| Jack Ma speaks at the opening ceremony of Mybank in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, June 25. (File photo/CFP) |
Chinese
e-commerce giant Alibaba has officially forayed into the banking industry with
the establishment of an internet bank that was officially opened June 25, our
sister paper Taipei's China Times reports.
The
Zhejiang Internet Commerce Bank was established by six shareholders led by
Alibaba's Zhejiang-based financial unit, Ant Financial. The internet bank will
mainly provide loans to micro-enterprises in the initial phase, according to
Alibaba founder Jack Ma.
China's
banking system is dominated by large state-owned institutions that have
traditionally favored lending to big, state-owned corporations. Small,
privately owned companies have often struggled to obtain capital.
Alibaba can
exploit its big data advantage by looking at its internal transaction data to
assess risk. That will give the company an advantage in terms of finding
micro-sized clients, said Jing Xiandong, chairman of the online bank.
Ant
Financial's new Sesame Credit agency will evaluate customers' creditworthiness,
using Alibaba's enormous database that comprises information from 300 million
"real-name" users and 37 million registered firms, according to an
earlier report.
Governor of
the online bank Yu Shengfa said that unlike traditional banks, the internet
bank can better safeguard customers' data through improved management of
information, using its big data systems and state-of-the-art technology.
The debut
of Sesame Credit will not only enable credit providers to make holistic and
accurate decisions, but will also allow other companies to provide more
credit-related services, a spokesperson for the bank said earlier.
Ma said
Alibaba's next step, following the launch of its internet bank, is to establish
a new financial system to serve individuals and small companies.
No comments:
Post a Comment