Ping An OneConnect Bank (PAOB) announced its pilot trial under the Fintech Supervisory Sandbox (“FSS”) of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (“HKMA”). PAOB is among the 8 virtual banks that have received a license from HKMA to operate.
To date, other virtual banks like ZA Bank, WeLab, MOX, Airstar have either soft-launched or fully launched their services in Hong Kong.
For its pilot trial, PAOB will invite about 200 selected trade SMEs and approximately 2,000 individual customers in Hong Kong to experience PAOB SME and retail banking services respectively.
The virtual bank will be leveraging technology for its parent company OneConnect which is technology arm of one of China’s most valuable insurance company, Ping An Insurance Group.
At this pilot trial stage, selected customers can experience services including account opening, savings, funds transfer and lending services.
Mr. Ryan Fung, Chief Executive of PAOB said,
“PAOB is committed to promoting financial inclusion and boosting Fintech development in Hong Kong via our virtual banking ecosystem. Leveraging advanced technology, we target to serve trade SMEs, which own their businesses in import/export industry. We believe that Hong Kong SMEs have enormous demand in trade financing, and the market is worth exploring.”
No Documents Required for SME Loan Approval
During this pilot trial, all selected SMEs are from PAOB’s key business partner, Tradelink which is best known for providing the Government Electronic Trading Services (“GETS”) for the Hong Kong community since 1997.
During PAOB pilot trial, selected SME clients can experience speedy account opening service, with no minimum account balance required. Selected SME clients can open business accounts with facilitation by PAOB SME banking app, officially known as “PAOB SME”, and a face-to-face interview with PAOB relationship manager.
Through the partnership with Tradelink PAOB said that it has created a unique risk assessment platform that enables SME clients to receive loan approval without submitting documents. PAOB also provides “5-Day Service Pledge”, which means PAOB can process and disburse approved loans to SME clients within 5 business days, otherwise eligible clients can be offered HK$1,000 cash compensation for over time.
“PAOB cooperates with Tradelink to evaluate the risk conditions of different trade SMEs by utilising risk assessment platform by PAOB and business data from Tradelink. Based on these risk results, PAOB can identify whitelisted clients which meet our certain financial requirements, so as to provide these clients with right products at right time. The innovated risk assessment platform enables us to trim down operating time and serve trade SMEs with efficient account opening and lending, so as to optimise our SME banking services and fit in with market trends.”
Added Mr Fung.
