FSC has actively studied the international financial technology development trends and domestic applications of financial technology for the preparation of the White Paper since the establishment of the Fintech Office in 2015. In order to meet the needs of the domestic industries, the FSC held a forum and several Financial Technology Advisory Committee meetings with scholars and experts then adopted their advice in the White Paper. The White Paper also incorporated information and communication service providers’ opinions via the forums held by the Ministry of Economic Affairs.

On April 27, 2016, after listening to FSC’s presentation about the White Paper, Premier Chang said that Fintech development has become an important strategy to enhance national competitiveness; Not only pursuing the financial technology industry upgrades but also delivering convenient, innovative digital services to the public shall the domestic Fintech vision. Therefore, the White Paper proposed the vision of building up ″innovative digital technology and smart finance″ by 2020 as the blueprint of administration.

The White Paper encompasses Fintech trends in five major dimensions: financial services, innovative R&D, talent cultivation, risk management, and infrastructure. It analyses Fintech in application, management, resources and infrastructure, and proposes 11 priorities focusing on the following:

A.       In order to enhance the efficiency of payment, the FSC is striving to double the ratio of e-payment within five years from the present ratio of 26% via the dual routes of public promotion and private sector participation:

(1)     Public sector: government agencies will take the initiative through collection of public service fees by e-payment. The Ministry of Finance will invite related agencies and parties to discuss the provision of such e-payment services. According to the Accounting Act, government expenses shall be reported and reimbursed with original receipts. The Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics, Executive Yuan will study the solution for such e-payment and e-invoicing. Moreover, the FSC will also provide suggestions to the Ministry of Finance about tax incentives for e-payment.

(2)     Night markets and small stores: the promotion of e-payment will focus on vendors in night markets and small stores that do not issue uniform invoices. The Ministry of Finance will choose certain sectors for introduction of e-payment system in the first stage. The FSC will also ask the Ministry of Economic Affairs to provide these businesses technical assistance for mobile payment services through the Industrial Technology Research Institute.

(3)     Medical Institutions: the Ministry of Health and Welfare will study the payment of registration fee by e-payment when they visit small clinics.

B.       The FSC will promote Blockchain technology, which has bloomed in some foreign countries, through related agencies and financial think tanks. Moreover, a special task force will also be created in the Bankers’ Association for research on applications of this technology. The FSC will also encourage the financial industry to use collective resources for joint efforts in the research and development of Blockchain technology applications. Meanwhile, the Ministry of Science and Technology will also encourage university professors to do research on financial technology. 

C.       As domestic information and communications industry is concerned about business opportunities created by financial technology, the FSC has allowed financial institutions to invest in 100% shares of a financial technology company through reinvestment. In the short term, it plans to finance innovation efforts of startups in financial technology sector with Financial Technology Development Fund and provide them coaching resources. In the mid and long term, the FSC plans to create a world-class incubation center for financial technology innovations and will work with the National Development Council and Ministry of Economic Affairs on provision of more financing and coaching resources to domestic financial technology sector for facilitation of its development.

D.       As for mobile payment that many people are concerned about, the FSC encourages the use of tokenization technology for physical and virtual cards to increase safety and convenience of such payment services. In addition, the FSC has also established a special task force to study the necessity of regulating financial activities of P2P lending through its supervisory activities

E.       In terms of promoting e-service of securities firms, the goals are to raise the percentage of e-orders to 70% and to promote the automated transaction mechanisms, such as Robot Financial Advisor” and launch of the platform for selling funds online, to enhance securities and futures services by taking advantage of cloud technology and improve performance of Big Data applications.

F.        In terms of online purchase of insurance products, the premium income generated by such business activities is expected to reach NTD 5.86 billion. The FSC encourages insurance industry to make efforts in innovation of financial technology and development of insurance products, and use Big Data in underwriting, claim and rate decision-making processes of insurance industry.

G.       The FSC will continue to work on development of physical and virtual branches of financial institutions, achieve the diversification of service providers and multiple access points of their services, improve the existing facilities of financial institutions and exploit new technology to create credit analysis model by using Big Data for improving credit risk warning capability of domestic financial institutions.

H.        An integrated, secure online ID verification mechanism will be created for convenient ID verification service in the virtual world, in order to expedite diversified applications of financial technologies.