Hello fintech friends,
Here we go again - Please find another week of Chinese fintech news, regulatory updates and product launches below.
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Licensing & Regulations
Tiktok’s Chinese sibling Douyin is finalizing the $190m purchase of a payment license from Chinese third-party payment provider Union Mobile Financial (UMF), signaling its ambition to enter the offline payment field.
India has decided to defer the approval of Paytm's 500 million rupee ($6 million) investment in its Paytm Payment Services arm, citing security concerns over a Chinese shareholding in the parent company.
ZTO Pay has completed the filing for its cross-border RMB payment business.
Payoneer is likely to acquire China’s payment license soon.
Allianz has secured regulatory approval for its fund unit in mainland China.
Product & Partnership Launches
Binance is looking to return to the Indian market by paying a $2m fine. It also secured a full virtual-asset services provider (VASP) license in Dubai.
Airwallex has a few exciting launches:
Launched its Borderless Visa Card in Canada, giving Canadian businesses a virtual card issued by Peoples Trust Company.
Partnered with BILL to help BILL customers make faster international payments.
Was selected to be the official payment partner of Bird, a Dutch communication platform.
PingPong Payments launched with TikTok Shop US and UK sites after launching in Southeast Asia. It has also become the exclusive payment partner for B2B ecommerce platform Pietra.
Ant Group Owned WorldFirst launched a new cross-border payment solution targeting B2B trade.
MoneyGram and Tencent Financial Technology announced a new partnership to facilitate digital remittances to users of Weixin Pay wallets throughout China.
Moomoo, a Singaporean investments platform owned by Futu Holdings of China, announced a global strategic partnership with Nasdaq and also claimed to have acquired over 1m users in three years.
Yeepay announced a partnership with SUNRATE to provide more compliant and efficient payment solutions to Chinese firms expanding overseas.
Japan's QR payment authority plans to partner with Chinese, Southeast Asian and Indian QR payment systems to launch an interoperable QR payment system by 2025.
Tencent has simplified the process of registering WeChat accounts and linking them to Weixin Pay for international visitors in China.
Alipay signed 11 partnerships aiming to create several International Consumer-Friendly Zones in China.
Checkout.com plans to accelerate growth in China.
Financing, Investment & Acquisition
The People's Bank of China announced a $70 billion re-lending scheme to boost the country's science and tech sectors.
Other News
Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma has sent a lengthy internal memo expressing support for the company's restructuring efforts. This is a rare move for the billionaire, who has remained out of the spotlight since his public criticism of Chinese regulators.
TikTok Shop’s merchant base has exceeded 500,000.
Other Reads
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