China

This Month in Fintech - China (June 23’)

Hi friends,

Welcome to our monthly China Fintech newsletter. We hope you are having a wonderful summer! For our US readers, happy July 4th and hope this newsletter can add a bit more fun to your long weekend.

June was an exciting month with a lot of movement from Chinese fintechs and regulators. Two competing cross-border payment providers are both preparing for IPOs in HK. Sequoia is planning to spin off China and India units. We’ve been covering Binance for many months now - June again was another challenging month for them.

Alrighty, let’s read on!

Best,

Ning

Venture Financing & Acquisition

Leading Chinese cross-border payment provider Lianlian Digital has submitted an IPO application to the HongKong Stock Exchange. Meanwhile, its US compliance chief Steven Teixeira was accused of insider trading.
There are rumors that PingPong Payments’ recent change in its shareholding structure signals that the fintech unicorn is preparing for an HK IPO.
The Huangpu district in Shanghai plans to launch an investment fund to support local tech firms.
Cross-border payment provider Sunrate has raised an undisclosed amount in Series D-1 funding, led by Prosperity7 Ventures and included a subsequent investment by Softbank Ventures Asia.

Licensing & Regulations

PingPong Payments announced an in-principle approval from the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) to operate as a Major Payment Institution (MPI).
Sunrate has obtained a Capital Markets Services license (CMS) in Singapore. It also holds a MPI license.

Product & Partnership Launches

Mastercard has partnered with Alipay to introduce cashless payments for international visitors in China.
WeChat Pay will start accepting global cards from July.
WeChat Pay has launched in Nepal.
Online brokerage Futu Holdings plans to open ‘experience stores’ in Hong Kong.
Hong Kong virtual bank Ping An OneConnect plans to expand lending to retail SMEs.

Other News

Venture Capital Giant Sequoia will spin off China and India units. Is Sequoia leaving China? We do not know yet but some have commented that this split sends a warning message to companies doing US-China business.
The Asian Clearing Union plans to launch a SWIFT alternative in June.
Cross-border payments platform Thunes opened up a Beijing office to accelerate its China expansions. It has also closed a series C funding round, securing more than $60M in total.
Hong Kong's central bank is reportedly planning to introduce a crypto framework tied to financial assets by 2024.
The Bank of China’s investment banking arm BOCI has issued tokenized securities on Ethereum in Hong Kong. It is the first-ever tokenized security in APAC.
Despite SEC scrutiny, Hong Kong legislator has invited Coinbase to the region.
Futu Holdings has been hit by a US investor class action alleging that it failed to properly disclose regulatory risk that it faced in China.
A suite of UK executives are leaving WorldFirst and being replaced by employees of its parent company, Ant Financial.
Binance had a tough month again:
- Binance’s Brazil head has been subpoenaed to appear before Congress concerning a Ponzi scheme investigation; The Belgian financial regulator has ordered Binance to cease all crypto services;
- The exchange left the Netherlands after it failed to get a license;
- Binance’s United Kingdom-based subsidiary canceled its registration with the Financial Conduct Authority, and It is under investigation in France;
- It was denied a crypto custody license in Germany and lost its euro banking partner Paysafe;
- However, Binance.US finally reached an agreement With SEC to avoid a full asset freeze.

What have you been reading?

I want to try out a new section in this newsletter to share the new books that we’ve been reading. They don’t have to be industry-related at all! We all need to take a break from time to time :P

I’ll go first. I am always an autobiography/biography kind of person. The books that I am reading now are: