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ASIA / PACIFIC Page 4 n THE ASIAN REPORTER November 2, 2020 Here’s why Ant Group is about to shatter IPO records By Zen Soo The Associated Press ONG KONG — Stella Su, who lives and works in Shanghai, has used an ATM only once in the past year. Instead of cash, in recent years she has done almost all her business using the digital wallet Alipay — shopping in a mall, buying stuff online, or transferring money to friends. “Now when I go out, I don’t even need to carry my wallet, all I need is my phone,” said Su, one of over a billion Alipay users in China and abroad. Alipay, operated by Ant Group, is the world’s largest and most valuable financial technology (fintech) company and one of two dominant Chinese digital wallets in China, the other being rival Tencent’s WeChat Pay. Thanks to the huge scale and potential of China’s fintech landscape, Ant Group is poised to raise about $34.5 billion in the world’s largest share offering, beating Saudi Aramco’s previous record of $29.4 billion. Ahead of the IPO, the company will be valued at about $280 billion. To tap both Chinese and global investors, Ant Group is listing its shares both in Shanghai and Hong Kong. It is due to begin trading in Hong Kong on November 5. The Shanghai debut has yet to be announced. Even before announcing its IPO plans, Ant Group was the world’s most valuable fintech company, with a valuation of $150 billion after a 2018 fundraising round. “Ant Group is much more than PayPal which only processes financial payments. It has a lot of businesses in other areas and with other services that would help 1.3 billion people in China,” Jackson Wong, asset manage- H GargANTuan offering. An employee walks by the logo of the Ant Group, left photo, at the company’s office in Hong Kong. Thanks to the huge scale and potential of China’s finan- cial technology landscape, Ant Group is poised to raise about $34.5 billion in the world’s largest share offering, beating Saudi Aramco’s previous record of $29.4 billion. Pictured In the right photo is a figurine of the Ant Group’s mascot. (AP Photos/Kin Cheung) ment director at Amber Hill using their digital wallets, platform Taobao. It held funds fund, called Yu’e Bao — one of the Capital Ltd., said in an interview. similar to how the Venmo app is from buyers to be released to world’s largest — allows people to sellers after goods were received. put idle cash in their Alipay “We are betting that Ant Group used in the U.S. “Ant Group is so valuable Alipay’s revenue mostly comes wallets to work and reap returns will be able to grow at a very high because Alipay is used on a from transaction fees charged to on investments as small as 100 pace in the future.” Alipay and WeChat Pay have day-to-day basis by a billion merchants. Users can link their yuan ($15). “In the past, wealth manage- helped make Chinese society people on all of their purchases,” bank cards directly to Alipay to ment products offered by banks virtually cashless, at least in big said Rein. “The scale of fintech in top up their wallets, and had many requirements, maybe a cities, with consumers and mer- China dwarfs the regular transfers can also be withdrawn minimum of 50,000 yuan (about chants alike relying on digital financial transaction potential in from users’ bank accounts. $7,500),” said Chen Zhoumin, Alibaba, which currently owns the United States.” payments using their phones. who works in a bank in Alipay evolved from e-com- a third of Ant Group, spun off “Think of Alipay as Visa, Zhengzhou, a city in central MasterCard, Citibank, Fidelity merce giant Alibaba, which was Alipay in 2011. The company was China’s Henan province. “But … all rolled up into one,” said founded by Jack Ma in 1999 to later rebranded as Ant as the Alipay has made it very con- Shaun Rein, founder and help match buyers and sellers in company expanded the range of venient to invest money, because managing director of China China’s fast growing market. its financial services. One of those is Zhima Credit — it made wealth management Market Research Group in When Alibaba launched con- Shanghai. “On the Alipay sumer e-commerce platform a private credit-scoring system accessible and convenient.” To compete with Yu’e Bao, platform, you pay for things, you Taobao to rival eBay in China, that rates the trustworthiness banks have begun providing buy insurance, you buy wealth Alipay was introduced as a pay- and creditworthiness of its users more flexible investment management. Your whole life ments method to boost users’ based on data such as whether products with lower capital trust in the platform. Today, users pay their bills on time via revolves around Alipay.” requirements, said Chen, who Walk into a supermarket in Alipay’s reach extends to almost Alipay. often invests idle cash in Yu’e Bao Zhima Credit scores can help China and one would be every aspect of life related to since it’s easy to do. people take out small loans from hard-pressed to find a customer money. “Digital wallets like Alipay and Ma’s foresight has made him Ant Group’s consumer credit digging around for loose change WeChat have revolutionized to pay for groceries. Instead, the wealthiest person in China, services Huabei and Jiebei to payments in China,” he said. cashiers scan a QR code on a with a fortune estimated at $58.8 finance such things as iPhone “Now, there’s also less worry that customer’s smartphone to deduct billion according to the Hurun purchases or school expenses. we might get counterfeit notes, or money from their Alipay or Research Institute, which follows Such loans are hugely popular in that our wallets may get stolen or China, where credit card usage is robbed since everything is done WeChat Pay digital wallets. The the country’s wealthy. Alipay was created in 2004 to low and most people have no digitally now.” transaction takes seconds. In restaurants, groups of serve as an escrow service official credit history and are AP journalist Alice Fung in Hong Kong friends often split the bill by between buyers and sellers on unable to borrow from banks. and researcher Chen Si in Shanghai contributed to this report. Ant Group’s money market transferring money to each other Alibaba’s e-commerce consumer Duterte says he can be held responsible for drug killings Continued from page 2 anything, any death that has occurred in the execution of the drug war,” Duterte said. “If you get killed it’s because I’m enraged by drugs,” the tough-talking president said. “If that’s what I’m saying, bring me to court to be imprisoned. Fine, I have no problem. If I serve my country by going to jail, gladly.” At least two complaints for crimes against humanity and mass murder in connection with Duterte’s campaign are being examined by an International Criminal Court GRASS-FED BEEF FOR SALE Call (503) 980-5900 for details GRASS-FED & GRASS-FINISHED BEEF Farm-raised in Newberg, Oregon Beef available as: q Quarter cow q Half cow q Whole cow Beef is processed by a Portland butcher. Pickup available in December at N.E. Sandy Blvd. location. (ICC) prosecutor, who will determine whether there is enough evidence to open a full-scale investigation. Duterte responded to the complaints by withdrawing the Philippines from the world tribunal two years ago in a move that human-rights groups said was a major setback in the country’s battle against impunity. The ICC prosecutor has said the examination into the drug killings would continue despite the Philippine withdrawal. Duterte has asked when did “drugs become humanity?” He framed his remarks by portraying the drug menace as a national security and public threat like the decades-long communist insurgency that the government is obligated to quell. “If this is allowed to go on and on and if no decisive action is taken against them, it will endanger the security of the state,” said Duterte, a former government prosecutor. “When you save your country from the perdition of the people like the NPAs and drugs, you are doing a sacred duty,” he said, referring to communist New People’s Army insurgents. There are 1.6 million drug addicts in the Philippines, Duterte said, citing statistics from an anti-narcotics agency. The figure is much smaller than the 4 million addicts that he cited the police as reporting early in his presidency to justify his crackdown. Police have reported at least 5,856 drug suspects have been killed in raids and more than 256,000 others The staff at The Asian Reporter wish you and your family a safe Thanksgiving holiday! arrested since the start of the crackdown. Human-rights groups have accused authorities of considerably under- reporting the deaths. Duterte said drug killings that did not happen during police operations should not be blamed on him, adding those deaths may have been set off by gang rivalries or settling of scores. There have been widespread suspicions of extrajudicial killings in the crackdown, allegations that Duterte and the police deny. In 2018, a court convicted three police officers of murdering a 17-year-old student after wit- nesses and a security video disproved their claim that the suspect was shot after violently resisting, a common reason cited by police officers after drug suspects are killed. Pandemic widens learning gap in education-obsessed South Korea Continued from page 3 future. “I have no regrets,” said Ma’s father, Ma Moon Young. “I’ve also had lots of psychological stress. I couldn’t really do what I had wanted to do for myself because of a lack of time and financial reasons.” Y.H. Yoon, a single mother of three in Seoul, worries her sons won’t be able to keep up due to her inability to send them to cram school, and her need to be out working instead of helping them while they study at home. But she urges them to study hard, regardless of the challenges of the pandemic and their own circumstances, so that they can get into good univer- sities. “I just tell them some- thing like, ‘Do you want to live like a mommy in the future?’” said Yoon, a high school graduate who works as a sales clerk. “It’s what my parents always had told me, and I’m telling my kids the same thing now.”