WEB DESK
China’s Ant Group, a financial affiliate of e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding, has been ordered for a major overhaul by Chinese market regulator to become a financial holding company. The new guidelines for Ant´s overhaul come days after Alibaba was fined $2.8 billion following an antitrust probe into the company founded by billionaire Jack Ma after derailing its planned $34.5 billion initial public offering in November last year. This will up the financial oversight by the government amid stepped up scrutiny of technology firms.
The People’s Bank of China and other financial regulators also ordered Ant to cease anti-competitive behavior in its payments business and improve its risk management and corporate governance. The regulators told Ant to rectify unfair competition in its payments business, break its information monopoly and to minimize the collection and use of personal data and to stop any illegal credit, insurance and wealth-management activities.
Ant Group said, it will spare no effort in implementing the rectification plan, ensuring that the operation and growth of its financial-related businesses are fully compliant. Ant is one of two leading companies in the online payments business in China, the other being rival Tencent. In January, China proposed draft rules to curb monopolies in the online payments market. Any non-bank company with half of the market in online transactions or two companies with a combined two-thirds market share could be subject to antitrust probes.