Ping An Insurance considers Singapore neobank licence
Ping An Insurance could be set to further reinforce its challenger bank reputation after ‘a person familiar with the matter’ revealed its fintech unit is considering an application for one of Singapore’s new digital banking licenses, Bloomberg reports.
The licence would allow Ping An’s fintech arm OneConnect to offer banking services to SMEs across Singapore, following its virtual banking license in Hong Kong secured earlier this year.
The insurance firm “sees massive opportunities in the new virtual banking space that reaches out to the underserved segment in Singapore,” says the representative.
OneConnect currently offers AI and cloud computing technology to more than 3,700 financial institutions across China and beyond.
But now the fintech team is “reaching out to organisations who are interested in virtual banking solutions,” following Singapore’s announcement that it will gift five digital-only banking licenses to non-bank firms in a bid to fire up more competition in the fintech hub.
The Monetary Authority of Singapore says it will accept all applications until the end of this year, and will reserve two of the five retail banking licenses for Singapore-owned firms only, leaving the remaining three licenses open to foreign or domestic countries.
