• Published on 30 April 2024
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MYbank leverages AI to finance 53M SMEs

MYbank, a leading digital bank in China and an associate of Ant Group, announced that the bank has cumulatively served over 53 million small and micro-sized enterprises (SMEs) in 2023.

The 2023 annual report also highlights MYbank’s continued investment in technology, with 36% of its operating expenses allocated to tech and over 64% of its workforce comprising of tech talents.

Feng Liang, president, MYbank said: “MYbank remains committed to supporting SMEs’ funding needs amidst ongoing economic and technological transformations. As a technology-driven bank, MYbank will enhance its capabilities through continuous exploration of AI and other emerging technologies, aiming to make finance more inclusive for all.”

Leveraging Ant Group’s self-developed Bailing foundational model and other new technologies, MYbank enables better-informed lending decisions, making financing more accessible to its extensive base of SME clients, all without the need for physical branches.

In the field of supply chain finance across industries, MYbank's Goose System employs AI-powered knowledge graph capabilities to map out SMEs across entire industry supply chains. Furthermore, the system enhances the bank's ability to assess SMEs' business status and creditworthiness through automated analysis of industry research reports.

In the automobile sector alone, the Goose System has served over one million SMEs, 64% of which obtained collateral-free loans for the first time. These loans enabled SMEs to undertake more orders, leading to an average monthly delivery volume increase of 17%.

MYbank has continuously enhanced its AI-powered conversational risk control solution, Lark System, to optimise credit line management for SMEs. Lark operates as a 24/7 digital customer service manager, automating customer interactions and processing various types of customer-uploaded information. Leveraging multimodal analysis, Lark accurately assesses customer needs and delivers tailored credit lines. As of the end of 2023, Lark had served over eight million SME clients with an average credit limit increase of RMB 45,000 ($6,214) per customer.

In agricultural finance, MYbank has been expanding the coverage of its Tomtit System, which utilises satellite remote sensing technology to identify crop types and estimate the agricultural output of specific farmlands that growers marked on a digital map. This system enhances the bank's ability to assess potential credit risks more accurately, empowering it to make informed credit decisions when farmers apply for collateral-free loans. By the end of 2023, the Tomtit System can recognise 15 types of crops, and 1.69 million growers across China’s 31 provinces have received online loans through the system.

Through continuous investment in technology, MYbank successfully meets the typically frequent, urgent, and short-term funding requirements of SMEs. In 2023, over 72% of MYbank’s three million newly added loan recipients obtained businesses loans from a bank for the first time. Additionally, more than 60% of MYbank’s SME clients received loans with interest below RMB 100 ($13.81), with the average loan size being RMB 72,000 ($9,943).

Re-disseminated by The Asian Banker