NEW YORK — Chinese authorities summoned 13 companies in the financial technology space including Tencent Holdings and ByteDance for an interview Thursday, as Beijing looks to further tighten regulations on the sector following its crackdown against Ant Financial.
The aim of the interview, as in the case of Ant, was to prevent monopolies and the “disorderly expansion of capital,” while also examining poor corporate governance, regulatory arbitrage and unfair competition, the authorities said.
The companies summoned Thursday, with large-scale operations and considerable influence in the sector, epitomize some of these problems, the People’s Bank of China — the country’s central bank — said in a release.
Agencies including the PBOC, the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission, the China Securities Regulatory Commission and the State Administration of Foreign Exchange held the talks, according to the central bank.
Those summoned also include New York-listed financial services platform Lufax as well as fintech arms of JD.com, Baidu, Meituan, Didi Chuxing and Ctrip. Pan Gongsheng, deputy governor of the PBOC, presided over the talks.
The authorities put forward seven rectification principles in the meeting with the companies. For one, all financial activities must fall under regulatory supervision.
Beijing has accelerated efforts to tighten control over the country’s fintech sector since it called off the $37 billion initial public offering of Ant Financial, the fintech arm of Alibaba Group Holding.
The regulators did acknowledge that in recent years, online platforms have played an important role in improving the efficiency of financial services, the inclusiveness of the financial system and reducing transaction costs, but they said the development of fintech business must serve the real economy and the reduction of financial risks.
Alibaba was hit recently with a record $2.81 billion antimonopoly fine.
