Shanghai Officially Launches Work on Fintech Sandbox Trial

Shanghai has officially kicked off work for its fintech sandbox trial in the wake of the launch of a similar pilot scheme in Beijing.

The Shanghai branch of the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) announced the launch of work on the Shanghai Fintech Innovation Regulatory Trial (上海金融科技创新监管试点) on 17 May, according to an announcement made via its Weibo account.

“This trial work will encourage the participation of multiple types of actors, and welcome applications for trial projects from licensed financial institutions that strive to achieve financial service innovations, as well as tech companies that satisfy requirements,” said Liu Xingya (刘兴亚), vice-chair of PBOC’s Shanghai office.

“Application projects can be for financial services, and can also be for tech products, but the projects must possess key traits such as operational inclusion, technical innovation, controllable risk and regulatory support.”

The launch of work on a fintech sandbox trial in Shanghai follows the unveiling of a similar scheme in Beijing at the start of 2020, for which a total of six proposed trial projects have already been vetted and accepted.

PBOC an­nounced in April that fin­tech reg­u­la­tory tri­als in the style of the Beijing pilot would be ex­panded to a to­tal of six more cities, in­clud­ing Shang­hai, Chongqing, Shen­zhen, Xiong’an New Dis­trict, Hangzhou and Suzhou. 

The launch of work on Shanghai’s fintech sandbox trial also coincided with the founding of the Shanghai Fintech Industry League (上海金融科技产业联盟) as proposed by Shanghai International Group (上海国际集团有限公司).

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