Fintech wave to boost banks' deployment of technology

Information technology deployment by Chinese lenders is expected to increase over the next three years to cope with the challenges and opportunities arising from the rapid development of financial technologies or fintech, according to a new survey.

About 45.7 percent of the lenders plan to substantially increase their investment in IT deployments, while more than 28 percent believe that IT deployments are crucial for business innovation and development, said the survey conducted by the China Banking Association and global accounting and auditing firm PwC.

The survey was based on responses from 1,920 individuals in the banking sector in all the 31 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions across China.

Bankers have high hopes for the development of technologies and firmly believe that challenges and opportunities can coexist in the future, said Richard Zhu, finance services leader at PwC China.

"In recent years, the disruptive effect of technologies on the banking sector has grown stronger. As a result, 59.1 percent of Chinese bankers are paying close attention to technologies, up from 41.4 percent in 2015 and 44.7 percent in 2016," Zhu said.

About 70 percent of the bankers said payments and settlements are most affected by financial technologies. According to the Beijing-based iResearch Consulting Group, the volume of third-party mobile payments increased by 382 percent year-on-year to 58.8 trillion yuan ($9 trillion) last year.

Nearly 60 percent of the bankers regarded mobile payment as a key area for development amid stiff competition.

Among various emerging financial technologies, big data received the most attention from 76.3 percent of the bankers in 2017, up 12.2 percentage points from last year. Other technologies that gained wide attention included internet technologies (57.7 percent), artificial intelligence (38.1 percent), cloud computing (35.3 percent), blockchain (27.7 percent) and the internet of things (22.4 percent).

More than half of the bankers said they have either applied big data to the operation and management of their banks or are developing relevant products.

"Enhancing the quality and effectiveness of financial services through technological innovation is an area of development with high potential in the next three to five years," said Lian Ping, chief economist at Bank of Communications Co Ltd.

He listed big data as one of the high-growth technologies that can be applied to small loans for retail banking clients and small and micro enterprises.

"Banks will use a massive amount of multi-dimensional data, including those on financial transactions, social activities, e-commerce and bill payments, to create an accurate client profile, so that small loans will become accessible to clients who are not covered by the credit reporting system of China's central bank. It will also help small and micro enterprises overcome financing difficulties," Lian said.

He advised banks to establish institutions or mechanisms to step up support for innovation driven by financial technologies, boost the fintech talent pool, and further improve the talent incentive mechanism.

Although the banking sector has pushed forward the combination of risk control with financial technologies for years, lack of internal data integration, poor accessibility of external data and talent shortages still remain the major problems constraining the application of technologies, the survey said.