Jack Ma Goes After Roboadvisors In China

Jack Ma, the billionaire founder of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd BABA, is looking to bring the growing trend of roboadvisors to Chinese consumers. Yunfeng Financial Group, a financial services company that is backed by Ma, created a roboadvisor application that can manage wealth for Chinese and Hong Kong investors. According to a Bloomberg report, the new service is called Youyu and is available for any consumer with at least $800 to invest.

Youyu partners with more than a dozen international mutual and money market funds and generates an investment profile for users based on their individual risk tolerance and other factors. Clients then track the performance of what was recommended to them and can compare their decision to other options made available at the time of the investment.

Fintech Now Available For Everyone

Yunfeng is targeting an ignored segment as financial services traditionally market their services to high net-wroth individuals — something there is no shortage of in China and Hong Kong. The creation of an app for the non-wealthy segment also comes at a time when 70 percent of Chinese investors are playing to increase their global allocation for investments over the next year.

Bloomberg noted that in Hong Kong, more than 75 percent of customers are comfortable with accepting and acting on advice for financial services that are automated. A similar acceptance rate was observed in other western markets, including the United States and the United Kingdom.

"Traditional institutions, their client base is quite limited, the resource is quite limited. They cannot provide the services," Yunfeng's CEO Li Ting told Bloomberg. "But for fintech, actually we can serve millions of clients online at the same time."

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