Alibaba financial services subsidiary Ant Financial says it is interested in expanding to Japan; the financial services firm has been expanding in the Eastern World with ventures in Thailand, Indonesia, Australia The Philippines and Korea; it already has plans to double the number of Japanese stores that accept Alipay to more than 45,000 this year; while further details on an expansion timeline have not been released, a spokesperson for the firm has said, "In Japan, there is a strong need of financial services from small and micro enterprises, and Ant is willing to share its standards and experience with local partners." Source
Ant Financial is planning to raise $3 billion primarily through a debt offering to finance its acquisition of MoneyGram; it is also planning for future acquisitions; the company has been valued at $75 billion and is still planning a near-term initial public offering. Source
In an interview at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Ant Financial's CEO Eric Jing talked about his plans for growth in payments and blockchain; firm is targeting two billion users by 2027; says it will more deeply integrate blockchain and artificial intelligence. Source
Japanese insurer Fukoku Mutual Life Insurance Co. has announced plans to replace 30% of its payment assessment department with an artificial intelligence system; the insurance company has partnered with IBM for use of IBM's Watson; the system will analyze and interpret medical documents for insurance payments; the company estimates it will save approximately 140 million yen ($1.19 million) per year by utilizing the new system; other insurance companies also exploring artificial intelligence for similar types of work include Dai-ichi Life Insurance Co., Japan Post Insurance Co. and Nippon Life Insurance Co. Source
Hong Kong-listed Credit China FinTech Holdings led the launch of the fintech fund with 11 other partners that consist of central state-owned enterprises, provincial investment funds, trust and securities firms and private equity firms; financial gain was not the main motivation of the fund as the participants are looking at exposure to the emerging fintech space and possible partnerships in the future; "China's fintech sector was started later than the West's but is expanding at an unparalleled pace compared with the West," Credit China Executive Director Sheng Jia said at the opening ceremony. Source
KPMG reports that fintech investment in Asia was $3.85bn in 2017, a significant drop from the more than $10bn invested in 2016; China was the biggest reason for the drop as the country saw only $1.3bn of investment in 2017; “Increasing government controls and regulations over fintech in China have kept many investors on the bench during 2017,” the report explained; one optimistic data point was corporate investment jumped in Q4 to 31 percent of overall deals. Source.
Franklin Tong, CEO of Astri, talks about Hong Kong's fintech industry influence on China; provides insight on how his company is using applied science to enhance Hong Kong's competitiveness in fintech; Astri was founded by the Hong Kong government and is focused on research and development for a range of solutions. Source
ASX has come under pressure to delay the implementation of a plan to use blockchain to clear and settle equities...
Speaking at StartCon in Sydney, Mike Cannon-Brookes, co-founder of Atlassian, shared his thoughts on the inefficient banking industry in Australia; some of the major problems are the lack of ability to access the data and the ease of being able to switch banks; Cannon-Brookes stated, "The lack of a banking API in Australia is crazy."; Australian banks make approximately AU$1,000 in profit per person, per year and their profits equate to 2.9% of GDP; this is due to the lack of competition and heavy regulations in the banking sector, according to Cannon-Brookes. Source
The Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) and Austrade have signed an agreement with the UK that will facilitate fintech innovation in both countries; the agreement will help to support introductions and the sharing of information on regional fintech business; as part of the agreement the CBA will also utilize its London Innovation Lab for UK and European networking. Source