Money360-affiliate M360 Advisors has registered with the South Korea Financial Supervisory Service; the registration allows institutional investors from South Korea to invest in the firm's real estate fund; the fund invests in secured US commercial real estate properties through bridge loans and offers global investors a high yield fixed income alternative; the fund has already received $65 million from a South Korean institutional investor and is planning for investment of $250 million in the first half of 2017; the fund is managed to provide international tax efficient investing along with high yield fixed income returns and has a number of other foreign investors including investors in China, Singapore, South Africa, Europe, Canada, the Netherlands and Kuwait. Source
One of China's e-commerce giants, Baidu, has obtained regulatory approval for Baixin Bank; follows banking sector business activity from competitors Alibaba and Tencent; the banking unit will be digital only, offering online banking, telephone banking, ATM and mobile banking services; Baidu owns 30% of Baixin Bank and will work in partnership with China CITIC Bank which currently owns 70% of the bank. Source
Capital Float will partner with Amazon India to provide loans for e-sellers; Capital Float will provide the loans through a credit facility called Pay Later which it is already using with e-commerce clients PayTM, Snapdeal and Shopclues; with the Pay Later solution, Capital Float is well positioned to service a fast growing e-commerce market which is expected to grow revenues from $30 billion in 2016 to $120 billion in 2020. Source
SenseTime has raised $60 million to support artificial intelligence technology development for the firm; SenseTime provides face recognition technology services to over 300 companies and also offers text, vehicle and image recognition; the firm's recent $60 million funding round was led by Shanghai-based Sailing Capital International. Source
At LendIt USA 2017, Lang Di CEO Gabriel Hai hosted a panel themed how fintechs are changing the way that Chinese people bank; one approach is to use big data technology to reach the individual credit market; panelists agree that China's fintech platforms are more willing to cooperate with traditional banks, as the banks have a more friendly regulatory environment and sufficient cheap money, whilst platforms are at advantages of bringing new technologies to the cooperation; however, Zhou Xinming, CEO of Hexindai, pointed out that China's fintech companies' customer base is more of individual investors rather than institutional investors, and the former are still not financially sophisticated. Source
26 executives associated with Ezubao were on trial this week in China; the fraud case included Anhui Yucheng and Yucheng Global, operators of the online platform, along with other company executives and platform employees; Ezubao has reportedly taken in over 50 billion yuan ($7.3 billion) in fraudulent investments through two platforms Ezubao and Sesame Financial; a final result in the case has not yet been announced. Source
Dianrong announced the hiring of former Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley banker Yawen Cui as the new CFO; now former CFO Xuxia Kuang has been named chief operating officer; Dianrong CEO Soul Htite praised Mr. Cui: "His extensive experience managing initial public offerings, mergers and acquisitions, and financial reporting will also help Dianrong explore opportunities within the capital markets. We are thrilled to welcome Yawen to our executive leadership team."; Long Hsiang Loh, the previous COO, will remain on the executive leadership team and a new role will be announced soon. Source
An investigation regarding fraudulent fundraising from Chinese peer-to-peer lender, Ezubao, has been underway since February 2016; regulators have reported all of the fundraising projects on the site were fraudulent and that the firm collected $7.6 billion from approximately 900,000 investors; Chinese regulators have recovered $1.5 billion in assets which include real estate, jewelry, stocks, cars and helicopters bought for company executives of the parent company Yucheng Group. Source
Sources report that Chinese online property and casualty insurance company Zhong An is planning for an initial public offering (IPO) in China; the firm was founded by Alibaba's Jack Ma, Tencent's Pony Ma and Ma Mingzhe from Ping An Insurance Group of China; a primary product for the firm is e-commerce shipping insurance which accounts for approximately 50% of the business; currently the firm's major shareholders include Ant Financial with 16% and Tencent Holdings Ltd. with 12%; in 2015 it reported a valuation of $8 billion and it currently plans to raise an additional 2 billion yuan ($290 million) to help it prepare for the IPO. Source