So I wrote this super extensive thing on Ant for our @TechBuzzChina paid newsletter subscribers, but I don't think they'll mind if I share it with y'all, so here it is:

TL;DR: I give context as to what Chinese investors / citizens think & why https://www.techbuzzchina.com/newsletter/signup/extra-buzz-19-ant-group-the-biggest-ipo-that-wasnt

CreditTech (consumer & SMB credit & lending) was over half of Ant's growth in the last 3 yrs & is now 39% of rev. It served over 500mm users in the last 12 months. So it's a BIG deal, for Ant.
Credit cards are still not super big in China. Ant targeted youth who didnt have one.

Unfortunately, besides the P2P fiasco we talked abt in Ep 72 of @TechBuzzChina, there have been university lending scandals of kids committing suicide due to debt. Ppl upset abt this.
But internet platforms see the opp & are jumping in like mad. EVERYONE is selling microloans.

Guys, literally, imagine if Google, Yelp, Uber, Pinterest, Twitter, etc. EVERYONE is trying to loan you money. & you're getting spammed left & right on ur phone & every YouTube creator's skit is somehow a sponsored ad for microloans. That's China right now. Is it predatory?

So yeah, lots of anger thus when Jack Ma said his now infamous Bund Summit speech saying regulators are dumb / too conservative / pawnshop mentality, even if he wasn't exactly wrong, the ppl didn't side w him mostly. (Ppl love credit, hate repaying debt!)

Now on this speech. It was mega high lvl. Opening keynote: China's Vice President. Duh. All regulators there. Impossible Jack was rude for no reason, he prolly knew regs were coming. Did u know Ant's Chairman Eric spoke the next day? The only fintech co! (Ray Dalio did too, heh)

Draft regs (but prolly will be law) hit loan limit (not big deal) & capital (big deal), making it 30%. Ant'll have $20Bn+ shortfall. How did they get here?! Well, there was some craziness w ABS issuance (40x in 1 yr) that happened. It stopped in 2018, but still, capital shortfall

Obv material change, thus IPO halt. The whole wk btwn Jack speech & IPO halt, state finance media has these pseudonymous opeds (& some signed ones) where they're advocating regulation. Quite good, I think
@ryansoh is translating 1, but at least 3 worth reading, I link to all

So there was this divergence btwn West: this is incompetent, decide what to do man, don't pull IPO 48 hrs prior, wtf

& investors of Chinese assets & bizfolk & citizens I spoke to who are: well thank goodness they did that, what a disaster otherwise, GJ regulators, Ant bad

& that puzzled me SO MUCH so that's why I wrote this.
New draft antitrust regs came out today, so there's gonna be a lot more on govt vs. BigTech, but for now, it seems that the regulators have gotten more respect, not less, from their key stakeholders. Pretty interesting. My 2c