Abstract

As an important part of a country's financial system, consumer finance is important to promote the upgrading of consumption structure, the performance of financial institutions, and economic transformation, etc. This book studies the history, current situation and prospects of the development of consumer finance in China. Besides, this book also analyzes the development of consumer finance in Japan and South Korea and conducts a comparative study.

This book is divided into nine chapters. Chapter 1 is consumer finance and its importance, in which we discuss consumer finance's concept, effects and its real economic foundation. Besides that, Chapter 1 also describes the overview of the development of consumer finance in China. Chapter 2 is the development of consumer finance in Japan. In this chapter, the current situation, history, development path, economic effects, legal system, market regulation, infrastructure of consumer finance in Japan are discussed. This chapter also conducts a case study. Chapter 3 is the development of consumer finance in South Korea. Topics discussed in this chapter include the current situation, history, market regulation, infrastructure of consumer finance and a case study in South Korea. Chapter 4 is retail industry's development and consumer finance in China, which investigates consumer finance in China from the perspective of retail industry's development. This chapter discusses the current situation and history of China's retail industry and particularly the prepaid card business in China. Chapter 5 is commercial banks and consumer finance, which investigates consumer finance in China from the perspective of commercial banks. In this chapter, consumer credit and bank card business are discussed. Chapter 6 is non-bank financial institutions and consumer finance, which investigates consumer finance from the perspective of nonbank financial institutions. The consumer finance business in those non-bank financial institutions is discussed in this chapter, including auto financing companies, consumer financing companies and small credit companies. Chapter 7 is the third-party payment and consumer finance. This chapter discusses the third-party payment business in China which has developed very fast recently. Special attention is paid to the Alipay business. Chapter 8 is insurance and consumer finance, which analyzes those insurance products which are closely related with consumer finance, including the automobile consumption credit guarantee insurance, student loan credit guarantee insurance and small credit guarantee insurance. Chapter 9 is the comparison of the development of consumer finance in China, Japan and South Korea and its implications, which summarizes and compares the characteristics of consumer finance in above three countries and their reference value for the development of consumer finance in China.