There is traffic, do finance, in recent years has almost become the norm, and communication operators with a large number of customers in the financial field layout is also tight. On December 29, a reporter from Beijing Business Daily exclusively learned that China Mobile is currently planning to lay out consumer finance licenses.
Since entering the financial industry in 2010, China Mobile started with a payment business, and gradually launched China Mobile Financial Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "China Mobile Jinke") at the end of 2018 through business integration and upgrading, fully carrying its financial business. After releasing the signal of full-scale financial business, China Mobile's financial business is still facing challenges in terms of license and user experience. In the view of industry insiders, the acquisition of consumer finance licenses is a key step in the diversion of China's mobile financial business from diversion to self-operation.
Schemes for the elimination of gold licences
The consumer finance industry is expected to welcome big players again. On December 29, a reporter from Beijing Business Daily learned from a source familiar with the matter that China Mobile is seeking a consumer finance license and intends to make new plans for its own financial business, but the specific progress still needs to be carried out according to the group's strategic arrangements.
If this license layout plan can be successfully implemented, the consumer finance license will become the third financial business license obtained by China Mobile after the third-party payment license and the insurance brokerage license, and can also become a powerful supplement to the financial business layout of China Mobile.
As a leading enterprise in the field of mobile operators, China Mobile has always been considered a "Buddhist" operation in the layout of financial services. Until December 2018, China Mobile Jinke was formally established after integrating China Mobile's payment, e-commerce and other businesses, and under the positioning of "communication + consumption + finance" integrated service provider, China Mobile's financial ambitions were gradually revealed.
On December 29, a reporter from Beijing Business Daily noted in the "Hebao" App, the core product of China Mobile Jinke, that the "Hebao" App currently provides users with payment, consumer finance, credit loans, wealth management and other services. However, subject to financial licenses, in consumer finance, credit loans, etc., it still adopts the diversion model of cooperation with financial institutions.
Taking the "number borrowing" business provided in the "Hebao" App as an example, relying on the loan services of licensed financial institutions such as banks and consumer finance, users can use China Mobile mobile phone number to make preliminary credit, but the specific amount and interest rate can only be determined after being reviewed by financial institutions. At present, in the "HeBao" App, publicity activities such as checking the credit line in the "number borrowing" and inviting new users to use the "number borrowing" to send and package coupons have also been launched.
On the number loan application page, the "Hebao" App also displays some "selected loan" products, provided by Xinnet Bank, Ping An Bank, Industrial Consumer Finance and other institutions, with loan amounts ranging from 1,000 yuan to 200,000 yuan, and loan interest rates are also different.
Pan Helin, executive dean and professor of the Digital Economy Research Institute of Zhongnan University of Economics and Law, pointed out that China Mobile's business is rich in extension, and it is reasonable to expand the business scope through payment, realize traffic realization with diversion, and prudently develop financial business.
"The layout of payment, insurance and other licenses, loan services mainly rely on diversion, this business pattern is more common in the giant's financial business layout." Su Xiaorui, senior analyst of Analysys, explained to the Beijing Business Daily reporter.
Su Xiaorui said that in terms of loan services, diversion is usually one of the forms of cooperation between traffic institutions and financial institutions for business development. The first is the lack of licenses, traffic institutions can achieve monetization through this way, and the second is that the financial business itself has a certain sensitivity, and the head institutions are more prudent. After China Mobile has accumulated in the financial field, the layout of consumer finance licenses can not only make up for its own license gap, but also help China Mobile expand other businesses.
Scene advantages and difficulties coexist
The development of consumer finance business is inseparable from the scene. For operators with a large number of users and offline stores, the development of consumer finance also has a unique advantage. One of the most popular scenarios is terminal credit purchase, that is, the installment business of electronic terminals such as mobile phones.
According to the information disclosed by China Mobile Jinke, terminal credit purchase is the foundation of the financial ecology of the "Hebao" platform, and at present, "Hebao Credit Purchase" has developed into the country's largest terminal installment consumption platform, serving 24 million users. In addition to serving individual users, Hebao also provides "first-come, pay-after-pay" services for 5G networks and hardware equipment to small and medium-sized enterprises.
The terminal staging service provided by the "Hebao" App is actually the contract machine staging service that users come into contact with in their daily lives. Users can enjoy the preferential amount by choosing different grades of call packages, and finally realize the preferential purchase or even 0 yuan purchase.
Taking the credit purchase information displayed in the China Mobile App as an example, users can enjoy a discount of 800 yuan to 3780 yuan when purchasing a mobile phone by choosing a 5G tariff package ranging from 128 yuan to 598 yuan and using it for 24 consecutive months. However, the preferential quota is not issued at one time, but needs to freeze a certain proportion of the balance treasure amount, and then gradually return it within 24 months.
Behind the huge user data and market is China Mobile's existing users and consumption scenarios closely related to the main business. But this staging scenario also has difficulties. In the "HeBao" App, there is also an introduction to the "credit purchase" business, and users can handle installment business through two ways: "first credit" and "no credit", but behind it is still the operational logic of financial institution approval and pre-authorization to freeze funds.
It should be noted that because ordinary users have less knowledge of financial loans, it is often the case that users find themselves "loaned" after handling related business, which further leads to complaints and disputes. This problem is widespread in the financial business of operators.
In addition, the Beijing Business Daily reporter learned that the "Hebao" App also has a "credit payment" business, which is gradually being piloted for users. After the user obtains the "credit payment" quota, it is used in scenarios such as paying phone bills and purchasing machines with credit. At present, in the "HeBao" App "Credit Payment" Recommendation Area, only the payment of phone bills is available.
In Pan helin's view, as an operator, China Mobile has natural advantages in user base, data and offline scenarios, and can expand the boundaries of enterprise business through financial services. However, for the model of operators embedding financial services in daily services, the general acceptance of users is not good, and may even further affect the company's reputation, resulting in the loss of customers in the main business. If China Mobile wants to continue to expand its financial business, it must also strengthen business management and improve user experience.
There will still be many tests
For whether the news of the layout of the consumer finance license is true and the specific progress, as well as follow-up business planning, etc., the reporter of Beijing Business Daily also asked for verification and understanding from the China Mobile Jinke.
In this regard, China Mobile Jinke responded that the relevant business layout of China Mobile Jinke is closely related to the national policy orientation, regulatory trends and the overall strategic layout of China Mobile Group, and in the future, under the premise of meeting the requirements of all parties, it will fully layout relevant financial and quasi-financial licenses, try to make financial technology as large and strong as possible, and improve the financial territory of China Mobile.
When talking about how to solve the problems in the scenario of terminal staging, China Mobile Jinke pointed out that in the business handling process, the company set up live identification, user loan notification and user holding notice, terminal product photo upload link and SMS notification prompts to remind customers of business handling. At the same time, the store monitoring system and the channel store rating system have been launched, and the reward and punishment mechanism of the black and white list of stores has been introduced to standardize the credit purchase business.
On the other hand, from the perspective of the financial layout of China Mobile Jinke, "Hebao" includes six major business sectors such as payment, consumption, insurance, e-commerce, super SIM, and credit information. Based on operator positioning, China Mobile's payment service chooses vertical scenarios as the entry point to achieve the purpose of reducing costs and increasing efficiency in a large number of settlement scenarios. The number of years that China Mobile users use China Mobile's numbers, communication credit behavior, etc., have also accumulated resources and data for China Mobile's other financial services.
Su Xiaorui pointed out that analysys Qianfan data shows that the number of monthly active users of China Mobile Apps in November was 66.2149 million, and the user structure is better, but the user stickiness needs to be enhanced. From the perspective of main business, as a business with small and high-frequency characteristics, it is difficult to combine with consumer finance, loans and other businesses, and how to give full play to its own strengths and organically integrate with financial business has become one of the challenges in front of it.
"Under the support of its main business, China Mobile can create more possibilities for the development of financial business." Su Xiaorui analyzed that compared with other similar types of institutions, it started late and had fewer layouts, which also added difficulties to China Mobile's financial business. If China Mobile wants to further expand its business, it first needs to improve its financial license. Compared with the credit reporting business license in its financial layout, it is less difficult to obtain a consumer finance license.
However, Su Xiaorui also stressed that the problem after obtaining the license should not be underestimated, the current consumer finance industry has many participants, the polarization pattern is obvious, customer acquisition capabilities, scene construction, compliance management and other factors will affect the results of business development. After China Mobile enters the game, it will also face many tests.
Beijing Business Daily reporter Yue Pinyu Liao Meng