彭博报道链接:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-02-12/china-s-trade-from-anywhere-markets-face-their-biggest-test
以下为彭博报道原文:
China’s Trade-From-Anywhere Markets Face Their Biggest Test
By Lulu Yilun Chen and Cindy Wang
2020年2月13日 GMT+8 上午5:00
China’s coronavirus outbreak is putting the country’s market infrastructure to the test like never before, highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of a decade-long effort to digitize nearly every aspect of securities trading.
With much of China’s financial industry working remotely over the past two weeks, trading in the nation’s giant equity and debt markets has continued without any major hiccups. At the same time, some firms are discovering limitations to contingency plans and work-from-home arrangements that may lead to a renewed focus on improving their digital capabilities.
Partly spurred by competition from a new breed of startups, China’s biggest financial companies have invested billions in cloud computing and other virtual infrastructure in recent years, enabling a relatively smooth transition to remote work for their employees. The outbreak may encourage laggards to step up their investments, while giving fintech firms a fresh opening to pitch services from mobile client management to digital security.
“China’s finance industry is probably one of the better prepared sectors for dealing with this crisis,” said Zhao Xinge, a Shanghai-based professor of finance at China Europe International Business School. “It grew in tandem with the development of the internet and technology, and the advantages of that effort are showing now.”
Trading activity in China’s $7.4 trillion stock market has soared since it reopened after the weeklong Lunar New Year break, with millions of amateur and professional investors placing bets from smartphones or home PCs. (Transactions in debt and currency markets have been more subdued, at about half the daily average over the past year.)
Remote access to office software via virtual private networks has kept disruptions to a minimum, brokers say, though slower internet speeds have been an issue for some.
He Qi, a fund manager at Huatai Pinebridge Fund Management Co. in Shanghai, said that while the current setup was “very inconvenient,” his department has only had to send a few people into the office to execute trades. Founder Securities Co., a Beijing-based financial services firm, said it’s requiring a small number of staff on rotation in the office while the rest work remotely.
Starting with the advent of online payments and electronic trading around the turn of the century, China has developed modern financial infrastructure that is in many ways on par with, or better than, more developed nations.
The International Monetary Fund has called the country a global leader in the application of technology to financial services, pointing to a combination of market scale, light-touch early regulation and the ability of large fintech firms to build integrated ecosystems.
The Shanghai stock exchange, for example, built an online trading network deploying encryption and identity verification systems as early as 2002. Today, 95% of securities trading is done online or via mobile apps, according to China’s securities watchdog. Most brokerages allow investors to place orders and set up new trading accounts over the internet, using online identity verification services that combine image and voice recognition.
Some fintech companies have seen a jump in demand for their services during the outbreak. Daily activity at Tencent Holdings Ltd.-backed QTrade, which operates a bond-market messaging service used by more than 600 institutions, has spiked by as much as 20% since the virus began forcing investors to work remotely.
(中文释义:疫情期间,一些金融科技公司的服务需求激增。腾讯企点QTrade承载着近90%的金融机构的债券市场信息服务,自疫情爆发导致投资者必须远程办公以来,交易员在QTrade平台进行线上交易沟通的日活量,激增了20%。)
“This outbreak presents an opportunity for China’s bond trading to become even more digitized,” said Fiona Liu, a co-founder of QTrade. “It gives companies a reason to further compartmentalize trading procedures, so more people can work without having to be physically present in the office.”
(中文释义:“这次疫情爆发为中国的债券交易提供了一个加速数字化进程的机会,”QTrade的联合创始人刘芳菲说。“这给机构从过去很多场合需依赖现场办公、到如今从现场搬到线上的工作模式的改变,提供了好的契机,这样更多的人就可以在家办公了。)
Bond traders use QTrade’s platform to negotiate prices via the QQ messaging app. It verifies identities, logs conversations and transactions for at least five years, and complies with securities regulations. In response to the outbreak, QTrade added a service that enables users to get in touch with traders on duty.
(中文释义:债券交易员使用基于QQ底层技术的QTrade平台来进行交易沟通谈判。QTrade支持核实交易员身份、留痕交易沟通信息,满足证监会合规要求。为了应对疫情,QTrade提供了一项新服务,通过QTrade提前收集整理的“机构远程值班表”,让远程用户能与在岗交易员及时取得联系,保证交易效率。)
Bloomberg LP, the parent of Bloomberg News, provides similar messaging and compliance services to traders.
For many in the financial industry, the past few weeks have underscored the need for continued vigilance to ensure their firms can keep operating at full capacity during crises.
“If the situation of working from home persists into next week or longer, the company may need to invest in software” to address backlog issues, said Amy Lin, analyst at Capital Securities in Shanghai. “In any case, digitization of companies will speed up because of this.”