Chengdu aspires to be the financial hub in west China

Financial hub in China's hinterland

The Financial Dreamworks is only one part of Chengdu's ambition to develop into the financial center in western China.

According to the 13th Five-Year Plan for Chengdu's financial industry, the city aims at becoming "the financial center in west China that serves the western regions, reaches the entire country and has global influence." Specifically, it eyes increasing its financial added value of 138.6 billion yuan (US$21 billion) in 2016 to 220 billion yuan by 2020, contributing more than 12 percent of the city's GDP by then.

Liang Qizhou, head of the Financial Work Bureau of Chengdu, said earlier this year that the city set out to become the leading player in three aspects: fintech, rural finance and consumer finance.

The city is especially keen on developing the fintech industry. Earlier reports said though Chengdu lags behind Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen in terms of the scale of the capital market, wealth management and many other aspects, the city has the potential to develop its fintech sector, which experts believe will be the next big thing in China's financial industry.

Deng Ke, CEO of Prime Fintech, agrees. As another of the startup tenants at the Financial Dreamworks Chengdu, Prime Fintech works on using the blockchain technology in the financial sector, which Deng believed would fundamentally change the architecture of the financial industry. The company started with seven people in February this year, and its platform now serves more than 10 million users. Deng said he expects the number to skyrocket to 60 million by the first half of next year.

Deng said the company chose to be based in Chengdu because the city government supports the development of the fintech industry and is passionate about building the financial center in China's western hinterland. A number of favorable policies are already kicking in, he said.