After nearly 10 years of rapid development, the digital economy has accounted for more than 30% of China's total GDP, and its contribution rate to GDP growth has reached nearly 70%.
At the "Seventh Management Accounting Summit Forum" held by the American Institute of Management Accountants (IMA) on November 20, Huang Shizhong, dean of the Xiamen National Accounting Institute, said that the total GDP created by the digital economy for China in 2019 was as high as 35.8 trillion yuan, accounting for 36.2% of the total economic volume, and it is expected that this proportion will exceed 50% in 5 years.
"Last year, the growth rate of China's digital economy was 17.3%, contributing 67.7% to GDP growth, creating more than 200 million jobs, accounting for 25% of the total number of employees." Huang Shizhong said.
Huang Shizhong, President of Xiamen National Accounting Institute
<b>How are data assets reflected in the</b> table?
Huang Shizhong believes that an important feature of the new economy is to rely on information technology progress and business model innovation to promote the sustainable development of the economy, including the innovation economy, knowledge economy, sharing economy, and digital economy. At present, the hottest and largest is the digital economy. The rapid development of the digital economy can be seen from the proportion of information technology listed companies in the total market value of listed companies in the past decade.
"In the past decade, the market value of U.S. energy listed companies has dropped from 11% and 12% to less than 5% of the total market capitalization, and the market value of information technology listed companies has increased from 12% to 27%. Similarly, in China, the proportion of listed companies in the information technology category has grown from 9% to nearly 23%, indicating that the economy has changed dramatically. Huang Shizhong said.
In the era of digital economy, the factors of production have also quietly changed. Huang Shizhong believes that in the era of digital economy, data and intelligent capital are the most important value drivers. Although data assets are the most important assets, he found that many important assets in the new economy are not reflected in the current table.
"Flushing sells data for a living, but it can't find it in its current and non-current assets; Alibaba Group's most important asset is digital asset, but these are not reflected in the statements." Huang Shizhong said.
Huang Shizhong believes that in the new economic era of intangible assets and data value, the current accounting standards are more than enough to reflect tangible assets, but they can be said to be inadequate in reflecting intangible assets.
Li Gang, vice president of the IMA American Institute of Management Accountants and chief representative of China, believes that in the face of digital challenges, management accounting also needs to keep pace with the times.
"Information systems, data governance, data analytics and data visualization will be among the essential skills for future accounting professionals. The development and application of new technologies will improve the accessibility, clarity, measurement and quality of reported information, thereby improving the comparability of information and enabling the free flow of data in the current platform. Li Gang said.
<b>Fintech poses regulatory challenges</b>
Zhang Chun, executive dean of the School of Advanced Finance at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, believes that the digital economy is also reshaping the financial industry. On the one hand, the digital age allows real enterprises and technology companies to obtain more big data, which can make finance better and more inclusive, on the other hand, it also brings regulatory problems.
Zhang Chun, Executive Dean of the School of Advanced Finance, Shanghai Jiao Tong University
"The original financial products can only be issued by banks, such as in the loan process, from customer acquisition to pre-loan approval, to lending, to loan risk control, to the loan, to the loan, completely in the hands of the bank, and now there is a joint loan model; supply chain finance was originally dominated by banks, later became dominated by core enterprises, and is now dominated by technology companies." Many of the functions of finance have been spun off from banks. Zhang Chun said in an interview with the first financial reporter.
Zhang Chun believes that it is a general trend to split some functions of finance into other industries, and it is also more effective and inclusive to do so. But the development of fintech also needs to be regulated, such as how to regulate capital, which is a very complex process and also requires innovative supervision.
"China is at the forefront of the world to a certain extent in terms of financial technology, and many countries in the world do not allow technology companies to do finance. China's achievements in mobile payment are due to the relatively advanced supervision in China, and there are some regulatory measures that keep pace with the times. Zhang Chun said.
How do fintech companies be regulated next? Zhang Chun believes that this should return to the essence of finance, such as high leverage, cash mismatch, asset securitization, which are the most basic elements of finance, once they are split into financial technology companies, they need to bear financial responsibilities and be subject to corresponding supervision.