Investment Summary
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) announced on December 4, 2020 that four successful digital bank applicants. The Monetary Authority of Singapore expects that the digital bank will be operational as early as 2022. Among four licenses, two are “Digital Wholesale Bank”(DWB) licenses, which are respectively granted to an entity wholly-owned by Ant Group and a consortium comprising Greenland Finance Holdings Group Co.Ltd, Linklogis Hong Kong Ltd, and Beijing Co-operative Equity Investment Fund Management Co. Ltd. The other two licenses are the “Digital Full Bank License”, which are granted to a consortium comprising Grab Holding Inc. and Singapore Telecommunications Ltd. (Singtel), and an entity wholly-owned by Sea Limited.
Razer (the “Company”) financial technology branch “Razer Fintech” once applied for a Singapore digital bank license, but the first round of the list failed. The Company’s management stated that although it failed the Singapore Digital Bank, its long-term development of technology and financial business strategy will be firmly implemented.
The management said that regional countries such as Malaysia or the Philippines also have a lot of opportunity. The long-term attractiveness of the Southeast Asian market lies in its demographic advantage. There are about 600 million young people in the region and the region’s middle-class population is growing rapidly. Favorable policies such as large infrastructure construction, these factors are conducive to the continued economic growth of the region, and bring huge business opportunities to companies operating in the region. According to e-Conomy SEA, more than a third of consumers are new to digital services in Malaysia and the Philippines which presents a huge market opportunity for us to be the first providers in the area of Fintech and digital financial services for them. We believe that although the Company has failed in the Singapore digital banking license, the Company intend to roll our Razer Youth Bank where Razer and Razer Fintech have already established a strong user base and local business presence, be it in regional countries such as Malaysia and the Philippines where digital banking application processes are expected to kickstart in the near term or other regions, such as Europe, Middle East or Latin America where regulators are similarly supportive of innovation in the banking sector to better serve the unbanked and underserved segments of the economy. It can be seen that the Company’s determination to develop financial technology business and the long-term value of Fintech business remained unchanged.