Internet finance is an emerging financial model that uses a series of modern information technologies such as Internet technology and mobile communication technology to achieve financial financing.

Under this model, the degree of market information asymmetry is very low, the supply and demand sides of funds can be directly connected through the Internet, and transaction costs are greatly reduced.

Most people are so excited and ecstatic about the emergence of such an emerging concept that they call anything that has the appearance of the Internet and finance as Internet finance. There are many discussions about Internet finance, but few people stand up.

Make a systematic classification.

Although Xie Ping, deputy general manager of China Investment Corporation, conducted a detailed analysis of the definition of Internet finance and the three core parts of payment methods, information processing and resource allocation in his "Research on Internet Financial Models" written in August 2012, this was only

Mainly analyzes mobile banking and p2p financing models.

Recently, some people in the industry have regarded crowdfunding, Bitcoin, Yu'e Bao, etc. as separate models of Internet finance, and have different classification instructions.

However, with the continuous innovation in the field of Internet finance and the deepening of society's understanding of Internet finance, some current definitions and model classifications in society are still difficult to fully cover the current development status of Internet finance.

In order to clearly define the model of Internet finance, the Internet Finance Laboratory of SoftExchange has been conducting in-depth research and visits to enterprises in the field of Internet finance since 2012, deeply analyzing information related to Internet finance, and analyzing innovative products and phenomena of Internet finance.

After careful research, the system finally sorted out six major Internet financial models, including third-party payment, p2p online lending, big data finance, crowdfunding, information-based financial institutions, and Internet financial portals, and was announced by Luo Mingxiong on April 21, 2013.

It was first proposed at the "Tsinghua Finance Week Internet Finance Forum".

Based on the recent hot phenomenon of Internet finance, in order to better communicate and discuss the research results of the Internet Finance Laboratory of Soft Exchange with the industry, the phenomenon based on Internet finance with certain business models is divided into six major models, and each one is briefly described.

Analysis for everyone’s enjoyment.

1. Third-party payment Third-party payment (third-party payment) in a narrow sense refers to non-bank institutions with certain strength and credibility guarantee. With the help of communication, computer and information security technology, they adopt the method of signing contracts with major banks to provide services between users and

An electronic payment model that establishes connections between bank payment and settlement systems.

According to the definition of non-financial institution payment services given by the central bank in the "Measures for the Administration of Payment Services of Non-Financial Institutions" in 2010, broadly speaking, third-party payment refers to the network provided by non-financial institutions as payment intermediaries for recipients and payers.

Payment, prepaid cards, bank card acquiring and other payment services determined by the People's Bank of China.

Third payment is no longer limited to the initial Internet payment, but has become a comprehensive payment tool with full online and offline coverage and richer application scenarios.

From the perspective of development paths and user accumulation paths, the current operating models of third-party payment companies on the market can be classified into two categories: one is the independent third-party payment model, which means that the third-party payment platform is completely independent of e-commerce websites and does not

It has a guarantee function and only provides users with payment products and payment system solutions, with Kuaiqian, Yibao Pay, Huifu Tianxia, ??Lakala, etc. as typical representatives.

Take Yibao Pay as an example. It initially relied on the gateway model to make vertical payments for industries. Then it took the information transformation of traditional industries as an opportunity and relied on its deep understanding of specific industries to tailor full electronic payment solutions.

The other type is third-party payment models led by Alipay and Tenpay that rely on their own b2c and c2c e-commerce websites to provide guarantee functions.

The payment is temporarily held by the platform and the platform notifies the seller of the arrival of the payment and delivery; in this type of payment model, after the buyer purchases the goods on the e-commerce website, he uses the account provided by the third-party platform to pay for the goods, and waits for the buyer to inspect the goods.

After confirmation, the platform can be notified to pay the seller, and then the third-party payment platform will transfer the money to the seller's account.

Third-party payment companies mainly have income sources such as transaction fees, industry user fund credit interest and service fee income, and deposited fund interest.

In comparison, independent third-party payment is based on the b (enterprise) side, while the third-party payment platform with the guarantee model is based on the c (individual consumer) side. The former indirectly covers the customer's user base by serving corporate customers, while the latter

Penetrate into the industry with the advantage of user resources.

The rise of third-party payment will inevitably bring challenges to banks in terms of settlement rates and the corresponding electronic currency/virtual currency fields.

The relationship between third-party payment platforms and commercial banks has gradually shifted from complete cooperation at the beginning to coexistence of competition and cooperation.

As third-party payment platforms move towards the front end of the payment process and gradually involve financial services such as funds, insurance and other personal financial services, banks' intermediary businesses are being continuously eroded by them.

In addition, third-party payment companies use the complete information on customers' purchases, payments, and settlements accumulated in their systems to cooperate with relevant financial institutions to provide their customers with high-quality, convenient credit and other financial services at a very low cost.

At the same time, payment companies also began to penetrate the credit card and consumer credit fields.