Friday, July 25, 2014

Alibaba.com partners Chinese banks on loan offers

News this week: The Alibaba Group’s B2B e-commerce subsidiary, Alibaba.com, announced a partnership agreement with seven Chinese banks to offer unsecured business loans to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) from mainland China.

SMEs using Alibaba’s OneTouch trade-services platform can borrow from RMB 1 million (US$161,000) up to RMB 10 million (US$1.61 million) depending on company’s prior six-month export history and creditworthiness, which Alibaba gathers through OneTouch – an Alibaba-affiliated import/export service company.

Other Alibaba.com suppliers who do not use OneTouch can also apply for smaller loans under the programme, but are limited to a lower amount. According to Alibaba, the company will be responsible for evaluating creditworthiness based on shipment data from customs agencies and logistics companies, while the final lending decision lies with participating banks.

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