Yibaili, the world's largest credit giant, which has been exhibiting in China 15, is about to withdraw from the Chinese mainland market.
Although there are different reasons for domestic and foreign-funded institutions to withdraw from the market, it reflects the same problem-credit reporting is not a track that can be successful by transplanting experience or investing.
Since 20 15, the opening of policies and the speculation of capital have catalyzed various companies to cluster together, and a number of emerging institutions have flooded into the credit reporting industry to find business opportunities without understanding the commercial nature of credit reporting, resulting in a large number of industrial bubbles. Inefficient investment and disorderly competition have also squeezed the normal market space. What lessons and enlightenment can the industry get after the bubble burst?
Small loan new rules become the "last straw"?
Yi Borui's withdrawal came quite suddenly. Just in June this year, 165438+ 10, the company just participated in the China International Import Expo (CIIE) held in Shanghai. In September, Jian Huang, CEO of Yiborui Greater China, attended a sub-forum on the theme of credit at the Bund Conference and gave a keynote speech. In an interview with the media earlier this year, Jian Huang also expressed his confidence in the China market.
Yiborui Group is the world's largest personal credit information company, headquartered in Ireland. It ranks alongside Equifax and TransUnion as the three major credit reporting agencies in the United States. According to official website Information, Yiborui currently operates 19 personal credit reporting agencies and 14 commercial credit reporting agencies around the world, providing data and information of 800 million individual customers and 99 million enterprises around the world.
Yiborui officially entered China in 2005, and its core advantage lies in personal credit investigation business, but it is difficult to set foot in this field in Chinese mainland. "Yi Borui has done a lot of work at the regulatory level, and the government relationship is good, but the personal credit data is too sensitive to be open to foreign investment." A senior person in the Shanghai credit information industry revealed.
In 2007, Yiborui entered the corporate credit information market by wholly acquiring Xinhua Xin International Information Consulting (Beijing) Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Xinhua Xin"), a commercial information service provider with the largest domestic market share at that time. In 20 18, the company changed its name to Yiborui Credit Information (Beijing) Co., Ltd. and was officially approved by the central bank for enterprise credit information filing. At one time, the market was full of expectations for its business expansion in China.
According to official website information, the current business model of Yiborui China includes enterprise credit investigation, decision analysis, anti-fraud, marketing and data processing. Among them, enterprise credit investigation and decision analysis are the core business.
According to the 2020 semi-annual report disclosed by EXPN. L On the London Stock Exchange, EMEA and Asia-Pacific region accounted for 8% of the Group's total revenue, which was further reduced compared with the annual reports of 20 18 and 20 19.
For the withdrawal of Yi Borui, some insiders believe that although it is sudden, it is also reasonable.
According to the above-mentioned Shanghai credit information sources, as early as 2008, Yi Borui was able to offer an annual salary of 300,000 yuan, which was quite competitive. However, in recent years, the market share has been shrinking, executives have changed rapidly, and products that are too competitive have not been seen.
Because the most advantageous personal credit information business can't be done, it can only be the second best. One of the pillar businesses of Ebro China in the domestic exhibition industry is decision analysis. Decision analysis is the decision engine in the credit system. Its function is that after the loan application, the decision engine will give the result of whether to give credit or not. "Yi Borui is very professional in decision engine and has a large market share in China. It is supported by its model of collecting data and exercising in the global exhibition industry. " Some insiders said.
According to official data, Yiborui has established strategic partnerships with many domestic financial institutions, including China UnionPay and a number of banks, and its business has penetrated into many fields such as e-commerce, retail, finance and payment.
However, it is worth noting that the important customer groups of the core product decision analysis of Yiborui are P2P online lending platforms and online small loan companies, that is, the groups that have not been covered by the central bank's credit information center for a long time. In recent years, the online lending industry has continued to fluctuate and the market players have shrunk severely.
The short board of enterprise credit information model is difficult to break
In fact, Yi Borui is looking for the corporate credit business of potential buyers, and the market it faces is not clear.
According to the above-mentioned Shanghai credit information sources, the business model of corporate credit information is to collect a corporate credit information report by telephone inquiry and visit. A more comprehensive report costs 1000 yuan. "Take Xinhua Letter acquired by Yi Borui as an example. Although it occupied a large market share at that time, its annual revenue was only tens of millions of yuan, making it difficult to survive. "
The crux of the problem lies in the fact that the value information that enterprise credit reporting agencies can collect is extremely limited. Li Ming, a former consultant of the Central Bank's Credit Information Center and an expert from Peking University Data Research Institute, pointed out at a recent closed meeting that in China, the corporate credit information market is different from personal credit information. Financial institutions do not submit information to corporate credit reporting agencies, but only regard corporate credit reporting agencies as data sellers.
"In the world, few corporate credit reporting agencies can obtain credit information from financial institutions. Even at present, many big data companies that have filed corporate credit reports have no credit information. They are only corporate information credit reporting agencies, not corporate credit reporting agencies. " He said.
This also broke the huge model of domestic and foreign credit reporting agencies, including Yi Borui. In the era of mobile internet, it is difficult to achieve real-time monitoring without mastering the first-hand core data of enterprises.
In Liu Xinhai's view, the business models of most domestic credit reporting agencies are the same, and almost all products are reports and ratings, which generally lack deep scenes and stay in shallow applications.
But in fact, the market demand for corporate credit information is not small. Yang, chief planner of Lianrun Credit Information, said at the aforementioned closed-door meeting that banks, insurance, securities, trusts and funds have different needs for corporate credit information reports in various market segments, and the credit information reports at three different levels of investment, financing and operation are also different, but the value of most credit information reports is not reflected at present.
"Strictly speaking, in the field of corporate credit reporting, only Deng Bai has found a way out through more standardized business, which has also raised the industry threshold to some extent." The aforementioned Shanghai credit information person said.
The market development model needs to be clarified.
According to an authoritative credit investigator in Beijing, although the localization of Yiborui is not well done, as a top international credit reporting agency, leaving such a big market with a cold heart is definitely not a good thing, which deserves reflection.
In this environment, Yi Borui's development strategy from Europe and America faces great challenges. According to Liu Xinhai, many services based on modeling and analysis, strategic consulting and software services of Yiborui are "priceless" in China, and there is demand in the market. However, many institutions are unwilling to offer good prices due to the problem of value cognition.
In an exclusive interview with the media in the middle of this year, Jian Huang said that from the global accumulated experience, data will never be an advantage for any company to do personal credit investigation. For any company doing personal credit investigation, the data should be fair, just and equal.
But this theory is still difficult to be verified in China. A person in the data industry bluntly said that it is difficult to engage in this industry in China without data and models.
Judging from the history of credit reporting in the United States, many early credit service organizations in the United States were based on regions, industries or different links in the industrial chain. Later, driven by database technology and commercial demand, there was a cruel reshuffle, forming three national credit reporting agencies and more than 300 issuing agencies. Will the domestic credit information industry follow suit in the future?
In Liu Xinhai's view, credit investigation is not a field driven by technology and investment. Credit investigation of construction enterprises is a long-term process, just like road construction. In the future, this field still needs "government+market" two-wheel drive. The government will open up data and formulate rules of the game (regulation, data protection, cross-border flow, information security norms, etc.). ), and market-oriented institutions will develop products and services and provide specific services. "At present, the business models of many enterprise credit reporting agencies are relatively homogeneous, not complementary, and there is no prerequisite for mergers and acquisitions."