【英语财经】百度拟联手中信推出在线银行 Baidu to launch online lender

Chinese internet search group Baidu

will partner with Citic Bank

to launch an online bank, local media reported, even as banks launched by Alibaba

and Tencent

have failed to meet

expectations.

Internet companies have shaken up China’s financial sector in recent years, with mobile payments, wealth management and peer-to-peer lending the biggest growth areas.

China Citic Bank, part of state-owned conglomerate Citic Group, suspended its shares in Shanghai and Hong Kong on Monday pending announcement of a “proposed external investment”. Baidu declined to comment on the report by 21st Century Business Herald, but said it would make an announcement today.

In January, Tencent launched the country’s first online-only bank, WeBank, named after the gaming and social media company’s popular WeChat instant messaging app. The financial affiliate of Alibaba Group, Ant Financial, followed with its own — MyBank

— in June.

China’s banking regulator granted bank licences to Tencent and Ant Financial as part of a pilot programme to encourage privately owned banks. In a sign of the government’s hope that private banks can help channel finance to small, private companies, Chinese premier Li Keqiang attended WeBank’s launch ceremony. China’s nine largest banks are all state-owned and favour lending to large, state-owned groups.

But WeBank’s maiden year has been rocky. Bank president Cao Tongresigned in September, and vice-president Zheng Xinlin, who handled interbank business, also recently resigned, the bank confirmed yesterday.

WeBank has granted Rmb4bn ($627m) in consumer loans, of which Rmb2bn are currently outstanding, it said. MyBank had granted Rmb3bn in loans to 180,000 small companies in four months, executives said at a news conference in October, without specifying the amount outstanding.

A key issue for online lenders is whether they can accept deposits under Chinese banking rules that require customers to present identification in person at a bank branch in order to open an account. In September, China Merchants Bank, China’s sixth-largest lender, ended an arrangement that allowed its clients to open WeBank accounts.

Citic did not reply to requests for comment yesterday.

Additional reporting by Charles Clover and Ma Nan

据中国媒体报道，中国互联网搜索公司百度(Baidu)将与中信银行(Citic Bank)合作成立一家在线银行，尽管由阿里巴巴(Alibaba)和腾讯(Tencent)分别成立的银行业绩并不如意。

互联网公司近年撼动了中国金融业，移动支付、理财以及个人对个人贷款（peer-to-peer lending，简称P2P贷款）成为最大的增长领域。

周一，国有企业集团中信集团(Citic Group)旗下的中信银行宣布其在上海和香港上市的股票停牌，等待宣布一项“拟议的外部投资”。百度拒绝对《21世纪经济报道》(21st Century Business Herald)的报道进行置评，但表示将于今日发布一份声明。

今年1月，腾讯发起成立了中国首家在线银行微众银行(WeBank)——以这家游戏与社交媒体公司流行的即时通讯应用微信(WeChat)命名。阿里巴巴集团旗下金融子公司蚂蚁金融(Ant Financial)随后在6月成立了自己的网商银行(MYbank)。

作为鼓励民营银行试点计划的一部分，中国银行业监管机构授予了腾讯和蚂蚁金服银行牌照。中国总理李克强还出席微众银行的启动仪式，以表示政府希望民营银行能够帮助小型私营企业获得融资。中国最大的九家银行都属国有，它们更偏向于贷款给大型国有集团。

但微众银行成立初年并不顺利。行长曹彤今年9月宣布辞职，负责同业业务的副行长郑新林也于近期提出辞职（该行已于昨日确认）。

微众银行称，该行已经批准消费贷款40亿元人民币（合6.27亿美元），其中20亿元人民币目前还未偿付。网商银行高管在10月的一场新闻发布会上称，该行四个月内已经向18万家小微企业贷款30亿元人民币，但未透露未偿付的具体数额。

在线银行面临的一个关键问题是，他们是否能根据中国银行业的规定接收存款，这些规定要求客户开设账户时必须亲自到银行网点出示身份证件。今年9月，中国第六大银行招商银行(China Merchants Bank)中止了一项允许该行客户开设微众银行账户的安排。

中信银行昨日未回复记者的置评请求。

查尔斯?克洛弗(Charles Clover)和Ma Nan补充报道

译者/陈隆祥