A new report on fintech and financial inclusion in China has outlined eight major trends for future development of the sector.
The “China Fintech and Digital Financial Inclusion Development Report (2018)” (中国金融科技与数字普惠金融发展报告（2018）) was officially released at the 2019 Zhongguancun Fintech Forum and Sixth Financial Inclusion Forum on 20 December (2019中关村金融科技论坛暨第六届普惠金融论坛).
According to the report China’s fintech R&D efforts have risen to the fore globally in just the past several years.
In 2016 the US filed the largest number of fintech patents with 4523 in total, while China took second place with only around half that figure.
By 2017 however, the report says that the number of patents filed by China in the five key areas of big data, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, biometrics and blockchain exceeded that of the US.
Looking ahead, the report outlines eight major trends for the Chinese fintech and digital financial inclusion:
i) The start of a phase of high-quality growth and structural optimisation of the fintech sector;
ii) A huge market space for digital financial inclusion, with targeted poverty relief, rural village revitalisation and small and micro-enterprise finance becoming the focus of operations;
iii) Fintech invigoration of the “B-sector” becoming the mainstream commercial model of the future;
iv) “Strong regulation” of fintech will become normalised, while regtech and other new regulatory models will emerge as the mainstream;
v) The core “ABCD” technologies (artificial intelligence, blockchain, cloud computing and big data) will further guide the horizontal in-depth development of fintech. Invigoratino via artificial intelligence and big data technology will further strengthen;
vi) The transition to opening banking will become a necessary stage for the future “match” development of the banking sector;
vii) Supply chain-financing will see the three trends of data network conversion, transaction standardisation and service refinement, gradually establishing the “supply-chain financing as a service” model.
viii) Scarcity of fintech talent means that talent cultivation will be established as the path to professionalisation and systemisation.
