“China has given its approval to Ant Group to operate a consumer finance company, a key positive step in the forced restructuring of its business just months after regulators slammed the brakes on its record-breaking listing. Ant will hold a 50% stake in the new entity and contribute 4 billion Chinese yuan ($625.93 million) in registered capital, the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission said on Thursday…The business will be able to give out personal loans and issue bonds among other things. The consumer finance company will also house Ant’s credit businesses Huabei and Jiebei. These are critical for the company and previously big drivers of revenue .”

“Ant Group Co. is planning to turn itself into a financial holding company overseen by China’s central bank, responding to pressure to fall fully in line with financial regulations, according to people familiar with the matter. Chinese regulators recently told Ant, which is controlled by billionaire Jack Ma, to become a financial holding company in its entirety, subjecting it to more stringent capital requirements, the people said. Ant, in response, has submitted to authorities an outline of a restructuring plan, they said.”

“Ant Group Co., the Chinese technology and financial-services giant that owns popular mobile-payments network Alipay, said it is planning initial public offerings in Hong Kong and Shanghai, bypassing New York as it seeks to accelerate its growth in China and abroad.”

“China’s largest financial-technology company is rebranding itself to emphasize the tech rather than the finance, after earlier drawing scrutiny from regulators. Ant Financial Services Group, an affiliate of e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., said it received approval from China’s top business and commerce regulator to change its name to Ant Technology Group Co. in its business-registration records.”

“Ant’s president of advanced technology business group, Geoff Jiang, told FORBES ASIA in an interview that the operator of the popular Alipay e-wallet wants to offer Chinese banks a wide range of technology products and services. Although the company spent years competing with them in payments and wealth management, it now plans to sell in-house expertise to the same banks and help them digitalize their operations with tools such as cloud computing and data analytics.”

“However, a lot has changed since then. The China-US trade war has escalated and tariffs worth more than $600 billion have been slapped on goods. In China, tech startups have seen fundraising dry up , while investors outside of Asia have also turned bearish after dramatic declines in the valuations of some leading technology players like Uber and WeWork, both of which share SoftBank as an investor. (SoftBank is an investor in Alibaba, which owns 33% of Ant.)”

“Ant Financial Services Group (Ant Financial) and Jiangsu-based Hoperun Information Technology (Hoperun) today unveiled its Distributed Core Banking Platform (DCBP), a next generation banking product which is designed to help financial institutions shift their business models from transaction-oriented to customer-oriented. The platform also aims to help financial institutions tackle digital challenges, including distributed development, financial product management and accounting liquidation.”

“Under the new brand, Ant Financial’s technology products and services consist of five product portfolios, namely large-scale financial transaction technologies, financial security technologies, financial intelligence technologies, next-generation interaction technologies and blockchain applications.”

“Ant Financial’s road to a $150 billion valuation has been a quick one. The company grew out of Alipay, the digital payments system that launched in 2004 and contributed significantly to Alibaba’s ability to succeed in e-commerce. When Alibaba went public in 2014, it officially launched Ant Financial through a spin-off. Today, the company operates some of the key financial services businesses in the massive Chinese market.”