P2P贷款的信用评级

P2P贷款的信用评级

中国最大的P2P借贷网站之一信而富的创始人兼CEO王征宇称，“一个人使用社交网络服务越多，就越能表明他关心自己的名誉和诚信，”而网购记录是另一个关键变量。（P2P是 peer-to-peer 或 person-to-person 的简写,意思是个人对个人）

测试中可能遇到的词汇和知识：

creditworthiness 商誉

peer 同伴

algorithm 算法

milieu 环境

China P2P lender banks on social media usage（565words）

By Charles Clover in Beijing

If you spend a lot of time chatting on social networks or playing computer games,you might be helping your credit score.

At least that is what one of China's largest peer-to-peer lending sites reckons,having rated 50m Chinese consumers for creditworthiness using social networking and computer gaming data.

The data were provided by Tencent,drawn from the internet group's hundreds of millions of users. They were processed by China Rapid Finance using an algorithm that looks at frequency and amount of time spent using Tencent services,everything from WeChat,the social chat app with 600m users,to Candy Crush Saga,the popular smartphone game.

The criteria may seem unusual but Zane Wang,founder and chief executive officer of China Rapid Finance,says internet user behaviour is sufficient to establish reliable creditworthiness.

Moreover,that is all there is to score some of the 80 per cent of Chinese who have no credit history or access to credit.

“These are 500m Chinese consumers who are currently financially active……but are not covered by the current financial system,” said Mr Wang. “That is the gap we are trying to fill.”

Using its non-standard scoring method,China Rapid Finance has arranged 3m peer-to-peer loans in the six months since its partnership with Tencent began in February. The company declined to disclose the monetary value of the loans.

The credit-scoring algorithm examines how long and how frequently people use Tencent services,said Mr Wang. “The more someone uses social networking services[the more it]shows that people are concerned for their reputation,concerned for their integrity,” he added.

Internet purchasing history — even buying points in an online computer game — was another key variable,he added.

“These criteria are different from traditional credit bureaus,but using the data we can still tell if a person will have a tendency to pay back a loan,” said Mr Wang.

How well the algorithm does in establishing creditworthiness is hard to pin down as the programme has only been running for six months,but Mr Wang said annualised loss rates were currently only slightly higher than the average for Chinese consumer credit cards.

The China Rapid Finance platform connects would-be borrowers with lenders who are seeking higher returns than are offered by bank deposits and potentially also an alternative investment to China's risky stock markets.

The loans are not exactly cheap,with a 21 per cent annual interest rate — about 3 percentage points more than traditional credit cards. Because the data do not shed any light on income or ability to pay back,borrowers start out small at around $80,with repeat borrowers enjoying credit up to $10,000.

China Rapid Finance was founded in 2001 and had a pre-money valuation of $1bn after its most recent $35m funding round in July. There is speculation it may be looking towards an initial public offering,although Mr Wang declined to confirm any plans.

Online peer-to-peer lending has developed rapidly amid a push by Beijing to expand financing for consumers and small businesses.

Upwards of 1,500 companies operate in China's P2P lending milieu. The largest,Lufax,is a subsidiary of Ping An Insurance and was earlier this year valued at $10bn in a funding round.

Ant Financial,the finance affiliate of US-listed e-retailer Alibaba,this year launched Sesame Credit Management,a credit rating system that draws on the Chinese ecommerce group's trove of user data.