阿里巴巴旗下餘額寶不斷吸引傳統銀行儲戶

Li Mingyang only joined Alibaba’s investment platform one month ago but he has already transferred almost all the cash in his bank account – nearly Rmb200,000 ($32,000) – to the online fund.

李明洋（音譯）一個月前剛剛開始投資阿里巴巴(Alibaba)的投資平臺——餘額寶，而如今他已把自己銀行戶頭裏幾乎所有資金——近20萬元人民幣（合3.2萬美元）——都轉移到這家在線基金了。

He is far from alone. More than 30m people in China have signed up to Yu’E Bao, or “Leftover Treasure”, only six months since its launch.

他的情況遠非個例。自上線僅6個月以來，餘額寶在中國已有了逾3000萬註冊用戶。

Initially pitched by the Chinese ecommerce group as a platform for its users to manage excess funds in their online payment accounts, Yu’E Bao is becoming something far more powerful: a straight-up substitute for traditional bank deposits.

起初，阿里巴巴對餘額寶的宣傳定位是，幫助用戶管理在線支付賬務裏富餘資金的平臺。如今，餘額寶正在變成一款比這一定位強大得多的產品，即傳統銀行存款的直接替代品。

“There’s no point in keeping money in the bank any more. This is just as reliable, more flexible and you can earn a lot more from it,” Mr Li says.

李明洋表示：“再也沒什麼理由把錢存銀行了。（餘額寶）這種方式同樣可靠，又更靈活，收益也大多了。”

A quick swipe of the Yu’E Bao app on his phone shows the Shanghai-based editor that he has earned more interest on his account over the past day than 94 per cent of other local users – an indication Mr Li is one of the bigger Alibaba converts, though not the biggest. “This is fun, almost like a computer game,” he says with a belly laugh.

他在手機裏的餘額寶應用上輕劃一下，屏幕上顯示出，這位生活在上海的編輯過去一天裏賺取的收益超過了94%的上海用戶——這表明李明洋是一位較大的阿里巴巴“皈依者”（儘管不是最大的）。他大笑道：“這很有意思，幾乎像是在打電腦遊戲。”

For every Rmb12 that companies and individuals have deposited in Chinese banks since June, they placed roughly Rmb1 in their Yu’E Bao accounts, according to Financial Times calculations based on official data. While it remains tiny compared with total deposits in the Chinese banking system, this migration of cash from banks to the Alibaba platform is only speeding up.

據英國《金融時報》基於官方數據的計算，自6月份以來，中國企業和個人每向中國各銀行存入12元人民幣，就會往餘額寶戶頭存入約1元人民幣。儘管與中國銀行體系的存款總額相比，餘額寶吸納的資金仍然很少，但資金從銀行流向餘額寶的速度正在不斷加快。

In the process, it threatens to upend the rules of China’s state-protected financial sector, eroding banks’ profit model and shifting power to savers in a way that was scarcely imaginable at the start of this year.

在這一過程中，餘額寶可能會顛覆中國受到國家保護的金融業行業的規則，逐步破壞銀行業盈利模式，並將權力轉移至存款人一方，這在今年年初的時候是人們幾乎無法想象的。

Other Chinese tech companies are getting in on the act. Tencent, developer of the hugely popular messaging app WeChat, is said to be designing a fund platform similar to Yu’E Bao. Baidu, the search engine company, began marketing investment products in October.

其他中國科技企業也在採取行動。廣受歡迎的消息應用微信(WeChat)的開發者騰訊(Tencent)，據說也在設計一個與餘額寶類似的基金平臺。搜索引擎公司百度(Baidu)則已於10月份開始推廣其理財產品。

“Internet companies, with their ability to instantly reach millions of consumers, have already started to subtly change the competitive dynamic in finance,” says Ernan Cui, an analyst with GK Dragonomics, a Beijing-based research firm.

總部位於北京的研究機構龍洲經訊(GK Dragonomics)的分析師Ernan Cui表示：“互聯網企業能夠即時聯繫到成百萬名消費者，這已開始微妙地改變金融領域的競爭態勢。”

Some see it in even starker terms. “This could be a game-changer. It is the biggest threat to the low- and middle-income customer base of banks,” says an analyst with an international bank who asked to remain anonymous as he was not authorised to speak to media.

還有些人的看法則更一針見血。某跨國銀行的一名分析師表示：“這可能會徹底改變遊戲規則。就中低收入顧客羣而言，互聯網金融是銀行面臨的最大威脅。”這名分析師要求在本次報道中保持匿名，因爲他尚未獲得就此對媒體發表意見的授權。

Richer customers have already started shifting their funds into banks’ wealth management products, which offer much better returns than regulated deposit accounts but have high minimum investment thresholds. With Yu’E Bao, users can invest as much or as little as they want.

手頭更寬裕的顧客已開始將資金轉移至銀行的理財產品上，這類產品比利率受到管制的銀行存款回報率更高，不過投資門檻很高。而餘額寶用戶的投資數額沒有上限也沒有下限。

Moreover, just like demand deposits at banks, users can withdraw their money from Yu’E Bao whenever they want. But while demand deposits earn an annualised rate of 0.35 per cent in banks – a level capped by the government to ensure that banks have plump profit margins – Yu’E Bao rates have averaged about 5 per cent over the past month.

另外，和銀行活期存款一樣，餘額寶用戶能隨時從餘額寶賬戶提取資金。如今銀行活期存款年利率只有0.35%（爲了確保銀行能獲得豐厚的利潤，政府將活期存款利率限制在這一水平），而過去一個月餘額寶的平均年化收益率則爲約5%。

Little wonder that it has drawn such rampant demand. Launched in June, Yu’E Bao has in short order become China’s most successful money market fund. As of last month it had raised Rmb100bn, the first to reach that milestone.

因此，餘額寶帶來如此巨大的需求也就毫不奇怪了。自6月份上線以來，餘額寶很快成爲了中國最成功的貨幣市場基金。到上個月爲止，餘額寶已籌集了1000億元人民幣，是首隻達到千億級別的貨幣市場基金。

Behind the Yu’E Bao brand name stands Tianhong Asset Management, in which Alibaba bought a majority stake in October. Tianhong invests all the Yu’E Bao cash in money market funds, mainly consisting of interbank loans and some short-term debt securities, according to analysts. So the cash still largely ends up with banks, but rather than paying a government-controlled rate for it, they pay whatever is the going market price for money.

站在餘額寶身後的那家基金公司是天弘基金管理有限公司(Tianhong Asset Management)，今年10月阿里巴巴收購了該基金大部分股權。分析人士稱，天弘將所有餘額寶資金都投入了貨幣市場基金，主要包括銀行間貸款及部分短期債務證券。因此，餘額寶的現金大部分最終仍流入銀行，不過這些現金的回報率是按照市場價格確定的，而不是按照由政府控制的利率確定。

It is, in other words, ushering in interest rate deregulation in a big way. This week’s spike in Chinese interbank rates in part reflects the growing competition for deposits. Given that regulators have been loosening their grip on interest rates but want to proceed in a gradual manner, the success of Yu’E Bao and other internet-based money market funds poses a big challenge to that strategy and could yet invite more scrutiny.

換句話說，餘額寶在以一種宏觀方式走利率去監管化的道路。上週中國銀行間利率的急劇攀升部分反映出銀行間日益激烈的攬儲競爭。監管機構一直在放鬆對利率的管制，不過他們打算以一種漸進方式推進利率市場化進程。有鑑於此，餘額寶及其他基於互聯網的貨幣市場基金的成功對這一漸進式策略構成了巨大挑戰，並仍有可能招致嚴格審查。

“The banking network will always have its place in the financial architecture, and the government will keep its hands on it, so I don’t think it will let Alibaba become a huge threat. It will be more of an addition,” says Billy Leung, an analyst with the RHB Research Institute.

RHB研究所分析師Billy Leung表示：“銀行網絡始終會在金融體系中佔有自己的位置，政府也會繼續插手。因此，我認爲政府不會容許阿里巴巴發展爲一個巨大威脅，阿里巴巴更有可能成爲銀行的一種補充。”

Alibaba downplays the challenge Yu’E Bao poses to banks. “The users that our platforms are serving may not necessarily overlap with those that are being served by the traditional banking and financial services industry,” says Alipay, Alibaba’s online payment system.

阿里巴巴也在淡化餘額寶對銀行業構成的挑戰。該集團在線支付系統支付寶(Alipay)表示：“我們的平臺所服務的客戶，與傳統銀行和金融服務業服務的客戶不一定重合。”

But in recent days Alibaba has launched an aggressive marketing campaign, plastering subway stations in Shanghai and Beijing with ads that leave little doubt the company has banks in its sights.

不過，阿里巴巴最近開始了一場咄咄逼人的營銷活動。在北京和上海的地鐵站裏，貼着阿里巴巴的廣告，這些廣告的內容令人不能不懷疑它已將銀行視爲對手。

“The Yu’E Bao annualised return is nearly 14 times higher than the demand deposit rate,” the ads blare. “It’s a wallet that makes you money.”

廣告中高調聲稱：“餘額寶累計收益率（年化）……是活期存款的近14倍。”還有句廣告詞說：“支付寶錢包，會賺錢的錢包。”