What The FinTech #102 - 26 Jun 2022
Happy Sunday & Welcome back to What The FinTech, your regular FinTech & Innovation Newsletter focusing on Hong Kong & Asia!
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What you would have missed if you had stayed in a cave during the entire week!
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What The FinTech Episode 5
I interviewed Alvin Kwock, Co-Founder of OneDegree. OneDegree was established in 2016 to accelerate technological innovations in the insurance industry and to make insurance more accessible to everyone. It has operations in Hong Kong, Taipei, Shenzhen and Singapore. Its subsidiary OneDegree Hong Kong received a virtual insurer licence from the Hong Kong Insurance Authority in April 2020. It has a multi-line digital insurance business that offers protection for pet, e-commerce, home, critical illness and digital assets for individuals and businesses.
To learn more about Virtual Insurance in HK, listen to this episode.
The previous interviews, and the next one, are available on podcast: Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts.
Dennis Shi - CEO of Mojodomo - Video on Linkedin / Youtube
Jessica Liu - Co-founder of Planto - Video on Linkedin / Youtube
Neil Tan - CEO of Neptune Digital - Video on Linkedin / Youtube
Percy Hung and Brian Tsang, co-founders of Choco Up - Video on Linkedin / Youtube
Alvin Kwock, Co-Founder of OneDegree - Video on Linkedin / Youtube
What The FinTech Episode 6
Next interview with Calvin Cheng, CEO & Founder of Wizpresso is released in podcast.
Join us on Wednesday at 6 p.m. for the live stream of the interview!
Check out the previous videos here: on What The FinTech, Instagram or Youtube.
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What was the FinTech this week in: 📰
HONG KONG
BIS Innovation Hub sets out new projects
Choco Up launches Choco Payment powered by Stripe to supercharge growth for digital merchants
DBS HK and GS1 HK look for more digital trade solutions for SMEs
BIS Innovation Hub sets out new projects
The Eurosystem Centre is expected to open in the coming months, with locations in Frankfurt and Paris and working together with all 19 Euro area central banks and the European Central Bank. The Innovation Hub will also expand its portfolio in the areas of green finance and supervisory and regulatory technology (regtech and suptech). The first three Eurosystem Centre projects are: “Cryptocurrency market intelligence platform”, “Post-quantum cryptography: securing the privacy of payments systems”, and “Increasing the transparency of climate-related disclosures”. In addition to the Eurosystem initiatives, the Innovation Hub's Hong Kong Centre will partner with the Bank of Israel and the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) on a new study on central bank digital currency (CBDC) and cybersecurity. It is also starting a new phase of its green finance Genesis project.
Choco Up launches Choco Payment powered by Stripe to supercharge growth for digital merchants
Choco Up, a global technology and financial services platform offering revenue-based financing for digital merchants and startups, announced the launch of Choco Payment. Embedded with Choco Up’s flagship underwriting capabilities and powered by global financial infrastructure platform Stripe, Choco Payment is an integrated payment solution that provides revenue-based financing of up to US$10 million to businesses with recurring revenues in verticals such as eCommerce and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), among others. With Choco Payment, business owners can access flexible working capital in as quickly as 24 hours to accelerate business growth, while using Stripe Connect to increase payment processing volumes. Powered by Stripe Connect, Choco Up now offers Choco Payment, a global payments processing solution embedded with growth funding, helping digital merchants overcome barriers to business growth. The Choco Payment platform integrates Stripe’s multi-currency payment processing capability with a single embedded payment gateway, allows digital merchants to accept online payments in more than 135 currencies across 180+ countries, and manage funds through over 10 different payment methods including credit cards, digital wallets, bank transfers, etc.
DBS HK and GS1 HK look for more digital trade solutions for SMEs
DBS Bank (Hong Kong) has partnered with barcode issuer GS1 Hong Kong to launch an on-demand digital trade financing solution for SMEs to utilise their trade data to access financing in a digital and straight-through manner. Alex Cheung, managing director and head of institutional banking group of DBS Hong Kong, said the partnership demonstrates the bank’s steadfast commitment to the SME community, “As a leader in SME banking, DBS is proud to partner with GS1 Hong Kong to support companies with timely working capital in this challenging business environment. By enabling the use of their trade data for enhanced access to financial services, SMEs can further fortify their business resilience.”
SINGAPORE
BNPL platform Optty adds Singapore FinTech Pace to Network
MAS and SFA invite entries for 2022 FinTech Awards
SG startup Beep pilots Voltality to simplify charging payment for EV drivers
BNPL platform Optty adds Singapore FinTech Pace to Network
Singapore buy now, pay later (BNPL) integration platform Optty’s services will now include the offerings of Pace. Pace acquired Rely, another BNPL platform, earlier this year. Rely was part of Optty’s ecosystem of BNPL partners. Now, Rely customers that were transitioned to Pace will be part of Optty as they were before. Optty is an independent platform, unusual for BNPL offerings, integrating numerous companies in the same place and allowing them to boost their sales and conversions, providing retailers a direct channel to numerous top providers.
MAS and SFA invite entries for 2022 FinTech Awards
Verizon Business teaming up with Mastercard and First National Bank of Omaha (FNBO) to launch a credit card designed to bring value to small business owners. In the coming weeks, existing Verizon Business wireless customers with less than 100 lines and an online account will be eligible to apply for the Verizon Business Mastercard®, which rewards purchases on everyday business expenses, such as eligible office supplies, technology, fuel, and more. Recognising the accelerated pace of digitalisation in businesses over the last two years, the theme for the 2022 Awards is “Embracing Digital, Charting the New Normal”. A new sustainability criteria has been included on top of the previous judging criteria of impact, practicality, interoperability, and uniqueness and creativity. This underscores the importance and urgent need for active integration of environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors as part of the overall FinTech business model.
SG startup Beep pilots Voltality to simplify charging payment for EV drivers
Singapore-based startup Beep announced the rollout of Voltality, which is dubbed to be Southeast Asia’s (SEA) first eMobility platform focused on offering a seamless payment experience. Voltality will launch its eRoaming service, VoltNet, through a pilot programme starting in June. This initiative support the government’s goal to increase electric vehicle (EV) adoption as part of the Singapore Green Plan 2030. The introduction of eRoaming through VoltNet will digitally connect Charge Point Operators (CPOs) and eMobility Service Providers (eMSPs) on a single network. This provides EV drivers in Singapore with the convenience of using any EV charger across the country with a single interface. The pilot programme will onboard 25 private-hire drivers from Gojek Singapore, and will be progressively expanded to all Gojek drivers renting EVs from its GoFleet partner, Singapore Electric Vehicles Pte Ltd. This pilot also counts Charge+, ComfortDelGro ENGIE, Shell Recharge, Keppel Volt, and Quickcharge.SG as CPOs.
CHINA
Tencent-backed broker Futu chases growth overseas after China rebuke
China's digital yuan wallet downloaded by 261m individuals
NetEase to launch app of virtual meeting platform Yaotai in August, as competition heats up on metaverse-related products
Tencent-backed broker Futu chases growth overseas after China rebuke
Tencent backed Futu plans to push deeper overseas to diversify its growth and is considering alternatives in case its New York listing is revoked, as China’s crackdown on private enterprise catches up with Internet trading firms. The global push underscores the dilemma facing the nation’s largest overseas-listed online broker as it awaits clarity from China’s regulators amid Beijing’s tightening controls over broad swathes of its economy. Futu plans to gain a bigger share of Hong Kong’s segmented brokerage sector as smaller rivals exit amid the market downturn, and tap into South-east Asia’s vast overseas Chinese population using Singapore as a stepping stone. It made initial success in its effort to diversify, with over 80 per cent of newly added paying clients in the first quarter coming from Hong Kong, US, Singapore and Australia.
China's digital yuan wallet downloaded by 261m individuals
China's digital yuan wallet has been downloaded by 261 million people - about a fifth of the country's population - and been used for transactions worth 87.5 billion yuan ($13.8 billion). In development since 2014, the e-CNY wallet underwent extensive field testing across the country before making its way to the iOS and Android stores at the beginning of this year. Although still in pilot phase, take-up has accelerated in recent months. The wallet is now starting to catch up with China's dominant commercial payment apps from Ant Group and Tencent, which together account for around 94% of the digital payments marketplace.
NetEase, China’s second-largest video gaming company, is ramping up efforts to commercialise Yaotai, its immersive virtual conference platform, as competition in metaverse-related products intensifies. It plans to introduce a smartphone app of the virtual meeting platform as early as August to help expand its user base. The app’s launch would mark an important update for the platform, which was launched by NetEase in October 2020 and can be accessed via desktop or smartphone through links. While the existing platform’s rendering process is currently handled on the cloud, the app would complete such rendering on users’ own terminals to “significantly lower the cost” of using Yaotai. Around 100 virtual conferences have so far been conducted on Yaotai by institutional customers that include universities and various enterprises.
ASIA
Alipay+ upgrades Cashier product
Minna Bank hits 1 million app downloads in first year
Japan on alert for greenwashing as it lends US$40b for ESG
In Malaysia, a big push towards going fully cashless
Philippines, Vietnam conducting CBDC feasibility studies with Soramitsu
Alipay+ upgrades Cashier product
Ant Group today announced the launch of Alipay+ Unified Payment. This major product upgrade provides a unified, scalable technical solution to help online and brick-and-mortar merchants collect money through all digital payment methods supported by Alipay+. Alipay+ offers a suite of innovative cross-border digital payments and marketing solutions, enabling merchants, especially small and medium-sized businesses, to better serve consumers worldwide. With this upgrade, Alipay+ Unified Payment further helps merchants directly reach over one billion consumers by making it easier for them to pay. Going forward, digital payment users in different countries can make cross-border payment with their local currencies wherever they see an Alipay+ sign, either online or offline, if the mobile payment methods they use adopt Alipay+ solutions.
Minna Bank hits 1 million app downloads in first year
Minna Bank, Japan’s first digital bank, has notched up over 1 million app downloads, and over 400,000 new accounts in their first 12 months. Minna Bank developed the first full cloud core banking system and plans to roll out its core banking systems to numerous international financial institutions. Still in the process of growth and development, Minna Bank plans to offer a personal loan service that will expedite the process of online loan applications, scheduled to launch in July 2022. Discussions are in progress with 160 Japanese companies and industries to include embedded finance, addressing the need for loans, deposits, and payments within the Bank’s financial function. Minna Bank has also been active in its advertising efforts promoting on social media and connecting with different industries through their partnered communities.
Japan on alert for greenwashing as it lends US$40b for ESG
A Japanese government-backed bank is set to spend about US$40 billion for sustainable purposes, and it will scrutinise the use of funds to ensure companies aren't greenwashing. The Development Bank Of Japan (DBJ), which has supported companies with funding during the pandemic, is gearing up to boost sustainable financing. It earmarked about 40 per cent of its total lending and investment, or 5.5 trillion yen (S$61.6 billion), for environmental, social and governance (ESG) purposes over the 5 years started April 2021. Sustainability-linked and transition-linked loans are growing in popularity in Japan, where carbon-intensive manufacturing is an integral part of the economy. Japanese issuers have sold US$2.2 billion of transition bonds, about 40 per cent of the global total.
In Malaysia, a big push towards going fully cashless
More Malaysians are relying less on using cash these days and turning more towards contactless payment options such as e-wallets for their daily spending. According to Malaysia’s central bank, Malaysian consumers made an average of 221 e-payment transactions each in 2021 — higher than the 170 in 2020 and 150 in 2019. The number of active e-wallet users has also jumped to 13.5 million in 2021, from 8.7 million in 2020. Survey by Visa also found that 55 per cent of Malaysian respondents claim they could go more than a week without using cash, a sharp increase from just 13 per cent in 2020. Among all Asean countries, Malaysia is tops when it comes to making payments online for home deliveries, with 84 per cent of consumers doing so. On the business side of things, digital-payment platform providers say they are seeing an increase in merchants asking for cashless payment services.
Philippines, Vietnam conducting CBDC feasibility studies with Soramitsu
Japanese blockchain firm Soramitsu has landed feasibility studies for central bank digital currency (CBDC) with both Vietnam and the Philippines. Soramitsu is establishing a considerable footprint in Southeast Asia following its successful implementation of Cambodia’s Bakong project in 2020. Last year it also started working with Laos’ central bank on a CBDC research project. The Nikkei states that a joint venture with Laos will be set up this year, and a state-backed Japanese institution (we’re guessing JIC) might participate. A key motivation is the expanding reach of Chinese payment apps Alipay and WeChat Pay and the rollout of the digital yuan, which they anticipate will be used in their countries. Vietnam, in particular, has been targeting de-dollarization, and its dollarization rate is low compared to Cambodia and Laos. Without its own digital currency, the country could win the battle against dollarization only to be swamped with the renminbi. In the middle of last year, the Vietnam government instructed the central bank to pilot a CBDC using blockchain.
BLOCKCHAIN - CRYPTO - DIGITAL ASSETS - DE FI
ETF That Bets Against Bitcoin to Launch
Meta set to begin testing NFTs on Instagram Stories with Spark AR
The metaverse and the importance of personal data protection in Southeast Asia
Tether plans to launch a stablecoin tied to the British pound
ETF That Bets Against Bitcoin to Launch
Financial firm ProShares is ready to roll out the first U.S.-listed short bitcoin futures exchange-traded fund this week, allowing investors to bet against Bitcoin after its price tumbled below $20,000 over the weekend. The Short Bitcoin Strategy ETF will trade on the New York Stock Exchange and go by the ticker BITI. Bitcoin has plunged 56% this year, while ethereum has plummeted 69%, according to CoinDesk data. Last October, ProShares launched an ETF for bullish bitcoin investors—the ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF, the first U.S.-listed bitcoin ETF. The fund trades under the ticker BITO and holds bitcoin futures contracts rather than the cryptocurrency itself. It raised more than $1 billion in assets from investors in two days.
Meta set to begin testing NFTs on Instagram Stories with Spark AR
Meta, announced Wednesday that it will begin testing NFTs on Instagram Stories using its augmented reality platform Spark AR. The company also stated that creators and collectors will be able to share their digital collectibles across Facebook and Instagram after they begin rolling out the feature on Facebook with select US creators at a later date. Earlier this week, Meta also announced it would partner with other tech companies to create a Metaverse standards body with companies like Adobe, Epic Games, Microsoft, Nvidia and Qualcomm.
The metaverse and the importance of personal data protection in Southeast Asia
Before Southeast Asia embraces wholesale the advent of the 'Metaverse', it is a matter of urgency for the authorities to address the current shortfalls in the protection of their citizens' personal data. The most respondents (60 per cent) were concerned about data security and privacy when using the metaverse. Malaysia ranked at the top (70 per cent), followed by Singapore and Indonesia (63 per cent respectively), the Philippines (60 per cent), Thailand (55 per cent), and Vietnam (47 per cent). In particular, the index found a glaring gap in the indicator of ‘protection of personal data,’ where five out of ten countries still had low ratings, indicating an uneven development of personal data protection legislation and regulatory authority among the ten ASEAN member states. Though Malaysia had the highest overall index rating among Southeast Asian countries, cybercrimes still threaten Malaysian citizens’ data. Singapore, which ranked second to Malaysia, is also threatened by data leaks, including a data trade of the details of 400,000 Singaporean Fullerton Health customers in 2021.
Tether plans to launch a stablecoin tied to the British pound
TETHER is releasing a crypto token tied to the value of the British pound as part of a push into new stablecoins. The GBPT token will be available to trade on the Ethereum blockchain from early July. The crypto platform also offers tokens pegged to the US dollar, euro, Chinese yuan and Mexican peso, having launched the latter last month. Tether has been harder hit by the crypto rout than rivals, such as Circle's USDC, and its dollar token briefly lost its peg last month. Total USDT circulation has dropped to US$67 billion, according to data from CoinGecko, compared with a peak of more than US$83 billion in early May.
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