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China wraps up fintech crackdown with big fines on Tencent, Alibaba

Posted in finance, governance

The regulatory crackdown that has shaken up China’s fintech industry since late 2020 appears to be coming to a close with the imposition of hefty fines on the country’s two digital payments giants.

Tencent, along with its payments subsidiary Tenpay, has been fined approximately 2.99 billion yuan ($410 million) by the People’s Bank of China for “its past regulatory breaches in relation to the provision of payment services in the mainland of China,” the company said in a filing on Friday.

On the same day, the central bank announced it will slap a 7.123 billion yuan (roughly $1 billion) fine on Ant Group, the fintech affiliate of Alibaba, for a range of illegal activities, including those concerning corporate governance, consumer protection, banking and insurance, payments and settlement, anti-money laundering practices and fund sales.