FT on Ant Financial, Yu'e Bao
The Financial Times writes "The transformation of Ant Financial," which says about money funds, "Ant introduced its Yu'E Bao fund in 2013, allowing customers to invest the piles of cash growing in their Alipay accounts. For years its Tianhong Asset Management subsidiary invested all of the money and it ranked as the world's largest money market fund. That is no longer the case today, with tighter regulations starting in 2017 gradually forcing Tianhong to shrink the amount each user could invest with the fund. Chloe Qu, an analyst at Morningstar, said regulators took action when they believed the Yu'E Bao fund had grown so large that a wave of withdrawals could cause systemic risk to the financial system." The piece adds, "Ant now offers competing funds in the Yu'E Bao slot and Ms Qu said most users have little idea which firm is actually managing their money. 'If you can get your product in the Yu'E Bao channel that's like a money making machine, people are just piling their money in,' she said. Ant earns a small commission on the money its more than 500m users invest with its asset management partners such as Invesco's China joint-venture and Bank of China Investment Management. It is the largest online investment services platform in China by assets under management, with a total of Rmb4.1tn invested through the platform as of June 30. Last year, the business line grew 22 per cent year-on-year and added Rmb17bn to Ant's top line."
