Users opting mobile payments exceed 520 million in China

Beijing: The number of China's mobile wallet users has exceeded 520 million with combined payments of over USD 6 trillion, Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba's financial services affiliate said today.

According to the People's Bank of China, Chinese banks dealt with 8.6 billion payments from mobile services in the second quarter of this year, up 40.5 per cent from a year ago.

The combined value of mobile payments jumped 33.8 per cent to 39.2 trillion yuan (USD six trillion).

The growth came as user-friendly platforms such as WeChat Pay encourage online transactions.

In April, Ant Financial, Alibaba's financial affiliate which runs the popular Ali Pay -- China's leading third-party online payment solution, said that it planned to spend 6 billion yuan in two years to popularise its payment system.

According to a report jointly produced by Tencent, Renmin University of China and French market researchers Ipsos, 84 per cent of Chinese said they are "comfortable" going out with only their phones and no cash, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.