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| When the coronavirus jammed up China’s economy last year, Rao Yong needed cash to tide over his online handicrafts business. But he dreaded the idea of spending long, dull hours at the bank. | 去年，当新冠病毒导致中国经济停滞之时，饶勇需要现金支撑他网店的手工艺品生意。但他又不愿意在银行白白耗去大量时间。 |
| The outbreak had snarled delivery services and made customers slow on their payments, so Mr. Rao, 33, used an app called Alipay to receive early payment on his invoices. Because his Alipay account was already tied to his digital storefront on Alibaba’s Taobao bazaar, getting the money was quick and painless. | 疫情导致快递服务陷入混乱，客人付款的速度也变慢了，于是，33岁的饶勇使用了支付宝这一应用程序提前收到款项。因为他的支付宝账户已经和他在阿里巴巴淘宝商城上的数字店铺绑定在一起，他可以很便捷地拿到现金。 |
| Alipay had helped Mr. Rao a few years before as well, when his business was just starting to expand and he needed $50,000 to set up a supply chain. | 几年前，支付宝也曾帮上饶勇的忙，当时他的生意刚刚开始扩张，需要30多万元来建立供应链。 |
| “If I’d gone to a bank at that point, they would have ignored me,” he said. | “你那个时候找银行，银行不会去理你的，”他说。 |
| China was a trailblazer in figuring out novel ways of getting money to underserved people like Mr. Rao. Tech companies like Alipay’s owner, an Alibaba spinoff called Ant Group, turned finance into a kind of digital plumbing: something embedded so thoroughly and invisibly in people’s lives that they barely thought about it. And they did so at colossal scale, turning tech giants into influential lenders and money managers in a country where smartphones became ubiquitous before credit cards. | 在为饶勇这样的草根阶层寻找获取资金的新途径上，中国堪称先驱。像支付宝的所有者、阿里巴巴旗下的蚂蚁集团这样的科技企业，把金融变成了一种数字水管：它在人们生活中嵌入得如此彻底和无形，以至于人们几乎注意不到。而这种嵌入的规模极其巨大，在这个智能手机先于信用卡风靡的国家，将科技巨头都变成了影响力巨大的借贷方和资金管理者。 |
| But for much of the past year, Beijing has been putting up new regulatory walls around so-called fintech, or financial technology, as part of a widening effort to rein in the country’s internet industry. | 但在过去一年的大部分时间里，作为控制中国互联网行业的更广泛努力的一部分，北京一直在针对所谓的金融科技筑起新的监管高墙。 |
| The campaign has ensnared Alibaba, which was fined $2.8 billion in April for monopolistic behavior. It has tripped up Didi, the ride-hailing giant, which was hit with an official inquiry into its data security practices just days after listing its shares on Wall Street last month. | 这场运动让阿里巴巴陷入了困境，今年4月，该公司因垄断行为被罚款182亿元。网约车巨头滴滴也遭到管束，上个月在华尔街上市后不久，其数据安全行为就受到了官方调查。 |
| This time last year, Ant was also preparing to hold the world’s biggest initial public offering. The I.P.O. never happened, and today Ant is overhauling its business so regulators can treat it more like what they believe it is: a financial institution, not a tech company. | 去年此时，蚂蚁集团也在为全球最大的首次公开募股做准备。结果一切都成为泡影，如今的蚂蚁集团正在整改业务，以便监管机构更能按照他们的定义对待它：即它是一家金融机构，而不是科技公司。 |
| In China, “the reason fintech grew that much is because of the lack of regulation,” said Zhiguo He, who studies Chinese finance at the University of Chicago. “That’s just so clear.” | 在中国，“金融科技增长如此之快的原因是缺乏监管，”在芝加哥大学(University of Chicago)研究中国金融的何治国说。“这简直再清楚不过了。” |
| Now the question is: What will regulation do to an industry that has thrived precisely because it offered services that China’s state-dominated banking system could not? | 现在的问题是：这个行业之所以能蓬勃发展，正是因为它能提供中国国有银行体系无法提供的服务，那对它的监管将产生何种影响？ |
| With Ant and other big platforms cornering the market, investment in Chinese fintech has fallen in recent years. So Ant’s chastening could make the sector more competitive for start-ups. But if running a big fintech company means being regulated like a bank, will the founders of future Ants even bother? | 随着蚂蚁集团和其他大型平台垄断了市场，近年来中国的金融科技投资有所下降。因此，蚂蚁集团受到的惩处可能会使这一领域的初创企业更具竞争力。但如果经营一家大型科技金融公司意味着要受到和银行一样的监管，谁还会费力去创办下一家蚂蚁集团呢？ |
| Professor He said he was mostly confident that Chinese fintech entrepreneurs would keep trying. “Whether it’s hugely profitable,” he said, is another question. | 何治国教授表示，他相信中国的金融科技企业家会继续努力。“至于这是否还能带来巨大的利润，”他说，就是另一个问题了。 |
| For much of the past decade, if you wanted to see where smartphone technology was making China look most different from the rest of the world, you would have peered into people’s wallets. Or rather, the apps that had replaced them. | 在过去十年的大部分时间里，如果你想知道智能手机技术让中国的什么地方看起来与全世界最不一样，就得去看看人们的钱包。更确切地说，是那些取代了钱包的应用程序。 |
| Rich and poor alike used Alipay and Tencent’s WeChat messaging app to buy snacks from street vendors, pay bills and zap money to their friends. State media hailed Alipay as one of China’s four great modern inventions, putting it and bicycle sharing, e-commerce and high-speed rail up there with the compass, gunpowder, papermaking and printing. | 不论贫富，人们都用支付宝和腾讯的即时通讯应用微信从街头商贩那里买吃食、支付账单、以及给朋友快速转账。官媒将支付宝与共享单车、电子商务和高铁合称中国现代四大发明，与指南针、火药、造纸和印刷术并驾齐驱。 |
| But the tech companies didn’t enter the finance business to make it easier to pay for coffee. They wanted to be where the real money was: extending credit and loans, managing investments, offering insurance. And with all their data on people’s spending, they believed they would be much better than old-fashioned financial institutions at handling the risks. | 但这些科技企业涉足金融，并不是为了让人们更便捷地购买咖啡。他们要做能赚大钱的生意：扩张信贷、管理投资、销售保险。再加上拥有那么多用户消费数据，他们相信自己在风险应对上会比传统金融机构强得多。 |
| With the blessing of China’s leaders, finance arms began sprouting out of internet companies of all kinds, including the search engine Baidu, the retailer JD.com and the food-delivery giant Meituan. Between 2014 and 2019, consumer credit from online lenders nearly quadrupled each year on average, by one estimate. Nearly three-quarters of such platforms’ users were under the age of 35, according to iiMedia Research. | 在中国领导人的支持下，各色互联网企业都开辟了金融部门，包括搜索引擎网站百度、零售电商京东以及餐饮外卖巨头美团。根据一项研究估计，在2014年至2019年间，网络贷款机构的消费信贷年均增长近三倍。艾媒咨询(iiMedia Research)的数据显示，此类平台近四分之三的用户年龄都在35岁以下。 |
| Last year, when Ant filed to go public, the company said more than $260 billion in credit was being extended to consumers on Alipay. That meant Ant alone was responsible for more than 12 percent of all short-term consumer lending in China, according to the research firm GaveKal Dragonomics. | 去年，当蚂蚁集团提交上市申请时，该公司表示通过支付宝向消费者提供了超过1.73万亿元的信贷。根据研究公司佳富龙洲(Gavekal Dragonomics)的数据，这意味着中国所有短期消费贷款的12%以上由蚂蚁集团发放。 |
| Then in November, officials torpedoed Ant’s I.P.O. and got to work taking apart the plumbing that had connected Alipay with China’s banks. | 然后在11月，官员们彻底阻止了蚂蚁金服的IPO，并开始拆解连接支付宝和中国银行的系统。 |
| They ordered Ant to make it less convenient for users to pay for purchases on credit — credit that was being largely funded by banks. They barred banks from offering deposits through online platforms and restricted how much banks could lend through them. At some banks, deposits offered through digital platforms accounted for 70 percent of their total deposits, a central bank official said in a speech. | 他们命令蚂蚁集团不要让用户能够方便地使用信贷付款——这些信贷主要由银行提供资金。他们禁止银行通过网络平台提供定存，并限制银行通过这些平台提供贷款的数量。一位央行官员在一次讲话中表示，在一些银行，通过数字平台提供的定存占其定存总额的70%。 |
| In a news briefing last week, Fan Yifei, deputy governor at the central bank, said regulators would soon be applying the full Ant treatment to other platforms. | 在上周的新闻发布会上，央行副行长范一飞表示，对蚂蚁集团采取的措施，监管机构也会推行到其他平台。 |
| “On the one hand, the speed of development has been astonishing,” Mr. Fan said. “On the other hand, in the pursuit of growth, there have arisen monopolies, disorderly expansion of capital and other such behaviors.” | 范一飞说：“一方面是发展速度非常惊人，另一方面，针对发展中出现的垄断、资本无序扩张等行为，我们也在陆续开展工作。” |
| Ant declined to comment. | 蚂蚁集团拒绝置评。 |
| As Ant and Tencent scramble to meet regulators’ demands, they have pared credit services for some users. | 随着蚂蚁集团和腾讯努力满足监管机构的要求，他们已经削减了部分用户的信用服务。 |
| One big hit to Ant’s bottom line could come from new requirements that it put up more of its own money for loans. Chinese regulators have for years disliked the idea of Alipay’s competing against banks. So Ant instead played up its role as a partner to banks, using its technology to find and assess borrowers while banks staked the funds. | 为贷款提供更多其自有资金的新要求可能是对蚂蚁集团利润的一大打击。多年来，中国监管机构一直反感支付宝与银行竞争的想法。因此，蚂蚁集团扮演一个银行合作伙伴的角色，利用其技术寻找和评估借款人，同时银行提供贷款资金。 |
| Now, though, that model looks to Beijing like a handy way for Ant to place bets without being exposed to the downside risks. | 不过现在，这种模式在北京看来是蚂蚁集团避免面临下行风险的便捷下注方式。 |
| “If problems arise, it would be safe, but its partner banks would take a hit,” said Xiaoxi Zhang, an analyst in Beijing with GaveKal Dragonomics. | “如果出了问题的话，它自己是安全的，但是它合作的银行会受牵连，”龙洲经讯驻北京的分析师张晓曦表示。 |
| When Chinese regulators think about such risks, it is people like Zhou Weiquan they have in mind. | 当中国监管机构想到这些风险时，他们想到的是周韦全这样的人。 |
| Mr. Zhou, 21, makes about $600 a month at his desk job and wears his hair in a swooping, reddish-brown mullet. After he turned 18, Alipay and other apps began offering him thousands of dollars a month in credit. He took full advantage, traveling, buying gadgets and generally not thinking about how much he spent. | 现年21岁、留着红褐色的鲻鱼头发型的周韦全，每月通过一份办公室工作能挣4000元左右。在他18岁之后，支付宝和其他应用程序开始为他提供每月数万元的信贷。他充分利用它们来旅行、购买电子产品，而且通常不会去想他花了多少钱。 |
| After Alipay slashed his credit limit in April, his first reaction was to call customer service in a panic. But he says he has since learned how to live within his means. | 4月支付宝大幅下调信用额度后，他的第一反应是惊慌失措地拨打客服电话。但他表示，他已经学会了如何量入为出。 |
| “For young people who really love spending to excess, this is a good thing,” Mr. Zhou said of the clampdown. | “对于特别喜欢超前消费的年轻人来说挺好的，”周韦全谈到压制信贷时说。 |
| China’s brisk recent economic growth has most likely made officials more comfortable with reining in fintech, even at the expense of some innovation and consumer spending and borrowing. | 中国近期的快速经济增长很可能让官员们更愿意控制金融科技，即使以牺牲一些创新和消费者支出和借贷为代价。 |
| “When you consider that household debt as share of household income is among the highest in the world right now” in China, “then more household debt is probably not a good idea,” said Michael Pettis, a finance professor at Peking University. | 北京大学金融学教授迈克尔·佩蒂斯(Michael Pettis)表示：“当你考虑到目前中国家庭债务占家庭收入的比例居世界前列，那么增加家庭债务可能不是一件好事。” |
| Qu Chaoqun, 52, was thrilled a few years ago to find he had access to $30,000 a month across several apps. But he wanted even more. He started buying lottery tickets. | 几年前，52岁的曲超群（音）发现自己每月可以通过多个应用获得约20万元贷款，这让他非常激动。但他想要更多。他开始购买彩票。 |
| Soon enough, Mr. Qu, a takeout-delivery driver in the megacity of Guangzhou, was borrowing on one app to pay his bills on another. He borrowed from friends and relatives to repay the apps, then borrowed again on the apps to repay his friends and relatives. | 在大城市广州送外卖的曲超群很快就在一个应用程序上借钱，用于支付另一个应用程序上的账单。他向亲戚朋友借钱偿还应用程序上的账单，然后再次在应用程序上借钱偿还亲戚朋友。 |
| When his credit was cut by almost half in April, he fell into what he calls a “bottomless abyss” as he struggled to pay his outstanding debts. | 当他的信用在4月几乎减少了一半时，他陷入了他所谓的“无尽的深渊”，因为他难以偿还未偿债务。 |
| “People inevitably have psychological fluctuations and impulses that can bring great harm and instability to themselves, to their families and even to society,” Mr. Qu said. | “人难免有时会产生一些心理波动甚至是冲动，会给自己和家人甚至社会带来很大的伤害和不安定因素，”曲超群说。 |
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