Ant Group hoping for 100m more investors
Ant Group's wealth management unit says it is hoping to add 100 million wealth management users in the next three years as many investors seek liquidity and reasonable returns at the same time.
It has unveiled a special section displaying bank deposits, mutual funds and fixed-term wealth management products to offer guidance to individual investors with relatively little experience and help them find suitable investment options.
More than 50 products are included in the section and the list will be adjusted according to performance and availability every one or two months.
It currently covers two types of products, one with a relatively stable return, such as deposits, and another which mixes fixed-income products with bonds and stocks, targeting investors willing to take more risk for a higher profit.
The selection process involved an expert panel from the China Securities Journal's mutual fund research think tank as well as management companies.
The recent bullish A-share market has buoyed investors' sentiment.
Over the past month, mutual fund purchasing volume on Alipay surged more than five times from a year ago and the number of fund investors more than doubled.
Wang Jun, general manager of the Ant Group Wealth Management Unit, said it hopes to partner with financial institutions and offer investment advice such as financial information analysis to help educate investors.
Ant's wealth management platform has already attracted more than 600 million users since the money market fund Yu'E Bao was launched in 2013 and with an accumulative investment return of 400 billion yuan.
Some 160 million Alipay users have also turned to other investment formats besides money market funds such as stocks, mutual funds or government and corporate bonds.
More than 71 percent of these investors are under 35 while many feel uncertain about their investment portfolio and objectives and thus are buying or selling funds more frequently.
