On the afternoon of September 2, 2022, WAIC 2022 "AI Gathering Financial Digitalization" Forum was successfully held at the Shanghai Expo Centre. The forum was guided by the WAIC Office Organizing Committee Office, hosted by Shanghai International Group Co., Ltd. (SIG) and Shanghai IceKredit Information Technology Co., Ltd., organized by Shanghai Guoxin Investment Development Co., Ltd., supported by the Shanghai Fintech Industry Alliance, and co-organized by Shanghai Trans Communications Consultants Co., Ltd. Members of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, experts from research institutions, as well as leading figures in the technological circles, the banking industry and the insurance industry were invited to explore paths of AI-finance integration, dissolve the risks of financial business management and operation, and envisage the new ideas and trends of fintech development through keynote speeches and roundtable dialogues. Also present were Zhuang Mudi, Deputy Secretary General of the Shanghai Municipal People's Government; Zhang Ying, Deputy Director of the Shanghai Economy and Information Technology Commission; Ge Ping, Deputy Director of the Shanghai Municipal Financial Regulatory Bureau; and Liu Xinyi, President of SIG.

On behalf of the Shanghai Municipal People's Government, Zhuang extended warm congratulations on the opening of the forum, noting that AI was becoming an important driver for fintech development. In recent years, during building an international financial center, Shanghai has leveraged the advantage of AI to promote the digital transformation and innovative development of finance, thus achieving positive results in the accelerated agglomeration of fintech enterprises, the in-depth application of inclusive finance and the constant upgrading of regulatory services. In the future, Shanghai will continue to leverage its strengths in the integrated development of the international financial center and the global sci-tech innovation center, push forward the digital transformation of finance, focus on developing top innovative technologies in the industry, open up an innovation path for the integration of industries, technology and finance, and create an inclusive and prudential regulatory environment.

Zhuang Mudi, Deputy Secretary General of the Shanghai Municipal People's Government, delivers an address 

Ge Ping, Deputy Director of the Shanghai Municipal Financial Regulatory Bureau, said Shanghai was going all out to promote the strategic deployment of urban digital transformation, and conduct digital transformation in economy, life and governance. Shanghai's financial industry has promoted the digital transformation and upgrading of the financial sector comprehensively and in depth, financial institutions and fintech companies have developed in an agglomerative way, digital yuan pilots and capital market fintech innovation pilots have been carried out, the digital transformation of financial factor markets and financial infrastructure in Shanghai has been pushed forward constantly, and Local Financial Regulatory Information Platform, Big Data Inclusive Finance Application 2.0 and a large number of financial technology major innovation projects have been launched. All these have provide important bases for financial digital transformation.

Ge Ping, Deputy Director of the Shanghai Municipal Financial Regulatory Bureau, delivers an address

Referring to the new features of fintech and the dimensions of its future development, Liu Xinyi, President of SIG, noted that digitalization had penetrated into almost all financial fields, financial institutions had attached greater importance to the absorption and cultivation of technological talents, and the agglomeration effect of the fintech industry had become more prominent. Amid the new round of technological revolution and industrial changes, to realize high-quality digital transformation, the financial industry should expand the service range, intensify digital technology research, promote the standardization of financial digitalization, and strengthen data security protection. In the future, SIG will continue to play its role as a state financial and capital platform, focus on fintech, financial digitalization and other fields, and further deepen business distribution, so as to make greater contributions to the building of Shanghai International Financial Center and Shanghai International Fintech Center.

Liu Xinyi, President of SIG, delivers an address

In the keynote speech session, Jiang Changjun, Member of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, shared his expertise in and insight into financial intelligent risk control under the theme of "Intelligent Risk Control of Financial Digitalization". According to him, the prosperous development of "Internet+" over the past three decades has promoted industrial integration. With breakthroughs in key technologies, Internet finance has undergone endless integration and innovation on the basis of extensive connectivity. The integrated application of big data, IoT, cloud computing, AI, mobile Internet and other emerging information technologies will eventually become a way to change the mode of financial market transaction and industrial organization. Fintech is continuing to promote the digital transformation of financial institutions, core technologies determine the pattern of the fintech industry, and the traditional financial industry presses for digital upgrading. At the same time, amid financial digitalization, financial frauds have increased exponentially year by year, and traditional regulatory means are no longer sufficient to cope with increasingly complex financial risks. To properly deal with the risks of digital transformation and allow financial enterprises to enjoy the benefits of digital transformation, we should make innovations from the source, aggregate methods of transaction fraud detection combining strategies and feedback, keep enhancing the real-time feature of risk control platforms and improving high concurrency technologies and capabilities, and base our practices on deep learning analysis models and online financial transaction detection technologies, thus solving the problems of identity theft and fraud screening in financial transactions, improving the performance and stability of intelligent identification of financial frauds, and securing financial transactions.

Jiang Changjun, Member of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, delivers a keynote speech 

Qu Xiangjun, Senior Managing Partner of McKinsey & Company and Head of Financial Services Consulting at McKinsey Greater China, looked at fintech development in the AI era from an international perspective. Under the theme of "Fintech Industry Development from an International Perspective", he shared his advanced perspective of overseas markets and oversea experience. He believed financial services would become important social infrastructure in the future like electricity and energy. Besides, in the metaverse era, fintech will thoroughly transform customer experiences. Eight key technologies: AI, super automation, blockchain, IoT, cloud computing, open sourcing, SaaS and serverless, no-code development platform and metaverse, will continue to influence the future of fintech, promote the reconstruction of financial business models and reshape the future competition pattern. Embracing fintech is an inevitable choice for financial institutions to win the future. Leading financial institutions usually take four key measures in this process: First, they portray clear blueprints for digital transformation, with their CEOs spearheading transformation, changes and massive innovations; second, they create fintech application scenarios and invest in innovative areas; third, internally, they promote the two-way and deep integration of business and technology in terms of organizational structure and operation mode; fourth, they establish professional technical teams, build "talent flywheels" and engineer culture, and create favorable environment for fintech innovation.

Qu Xiangjun, Senior Managing Partner of McKinsey & Company and Head of Financial Services Consulting at McKinsey Greater China, delivers a keynote speech

The other two keynote speakers also elaborated on the current situation and development trend of AI application in finance from respective professional perspectives. Xie Minqi, Vice President of IceKredit, explained how AI empowers the digital transformation of banks and the solutions of small and micro finance in the post-COVID-19 era. He said, with the rise of digitalization as an important strategic means to promote national social and economic development, as well as the accelerated application of digital technologies like artificial intelligence, big data, cloud computing, blockchain and 5G, digital transformation has become inevitable. The transformation of China's banking industry has been troubled by problems such as unclear strategic planning, weak big data support, talent deficiencies and lack of financial service scenarios. Federated learning, natural language processing, mapping knowledge domain and other advanced AI technologies will empower the digital transformation of banks. However, technical lead not only lies in algorithms, but also in the understanding of business or the ability to apply technologies in corresponding business scenarios. In the post-COVID-19 era, banks are exploring applications such as supply chain finance, technology loan and scenario loan all time, to seek solutions for micro and small business finance. Sci-tech companies represented by IceKredit are also developing corresponding AI-based models and solutions, playing their positive and important roles in the development of micro and small finance and the digital transformation of banks.

Xie Minqi, Vice President of IceKredit, delivers a keynote speech

Wei Jiaohua, Deputy Party Secretary and Executive Deputy General Manager of CPIC Technology Co., Ltd., shared his thought on fintech and the insurance industry. He said fintech and insurance technologies had started to change the industry from the outside to the inside, and were likely to bring about disruptive and traceable changes. AI penetration will be unstoppable for areas that can be fully digitalized, simple and repetitive work will be replaced, and inefficient and complex work will be optimized. More and more insurance companies have started to explore the application of big data, IoT, blockchain and AI in products and services. In the future, Internet insurance will reconstruct insurance experiences, service models and claims processes with decentralization, fragmentation, scenarios and disintermediation as core. Take auto insurance for example, driving and environmental big data enable insurance companies to perceive and predict risks in real time, individual prediction models to replace historical data models, identification technologies to disrupt customer experiences, and machine learning to disrupt technologies and sales. From blockchain and AI to SaaS-based shared services, a series of intelligent technologies and services have brought about the change of insurance companies from risk bearers into risk interveners, realizing interaction, intelligent entry, intelligent operation and knowledge governance.

Wei Jiaohua, Deputy Party Secretary and Executive Deputy General Manager of CPIC Technology Co., Ltd., delivers a keynote speech

The forum also includes a roundtable dialogue on "risk prevention and control", which discussed the problem of digital divide brought by the application of intelligent technology amid the wave of digitalization, and made suggestions on the prevalent problem of unbalanced and insufficient development arising in the digital transformation of financial institutions at present. Li Feng, Professor of Shanghai Advanced Institute of Finance, Shanghai Jiao Tong University; Yang Wanqiang, Chairman of Shanghai Fairyland Software Co., Ltd.; Yang Daquan, Vice President of Shanghai Jiemian CLS Technologies Co., Ltd.; Huang Xianfeng, Vice President of Shanghai Kingstar Fintech Co., Ltd. and Jin Dewei, Chairman of Shanghai Meishi Technology Co., Ltd. were invited to explore the development opportunity of risk control empowered by financial digitalization from different perspectives such as AI-powered financial application scenarios, regulatory technology, compliance issues and evaluation standards.

(Roundtable discussion) 

Speaking of the application prospects of AI technologies such as mapping knowledge domain and deep learning in the financial industry, Yang Wanqiang analyzed the case of AI helping insurance companies prevent insurance frauds; Yang Daquan shared the advanced applications of AI in enterprise risk identification and prediction from the perspective of practical application, and said CLS was using its application tools for information distribution, risk warning, intelligence analysis and Whale Platform to create a closed loop of "media + information + data + service + transaction"; Huang Xianfeng shared Kingstar's experience in designing and developing digital regulation tools for fintech companies to prevent money laundering, guard against risks and improve regulation efficiency; from the perspective of private equity funds, Jin Dewei introduced the application of AI in fund management identification and its role in industry standardization.

(A scene of the forum)

In the era of digital economy, accelerating the deep integration of finance and technology has become a global consensus, new financial business forms and models are emerging endlessly, and financial digitalization that provides a new path for financial transformation and upgrading is an indispensable part of the digital transformation of cities. The success of this forum has effectively promoted the innovation and integration of fintech research, learning and application, and is of great significance to better using AI to precisely empower financial digitalization, promoting the innovative application of AI in the financial sector, and accelerating the reform and development of the financial industry.