XOX To Exceed 20 Sen Tomorrow on RM1 Billion Micro-financing News? | Hey guys! XOX Bhd, one of top e-wallet licence holders in Malaysia has partnered Wetek Technology (M) Sdn Bhd to provide micro-financing to the tune of RM1 billion to its existing 2.2 million subscribers. They are targeting entrepreneurs and small business owners. What we need to know more about this is whether Wetek will also rope in XOX for its expansion in Southeast Asia.
In a statement issued today which we got a hold off, Wetek director Howard Leung Hao said that the company (Wetek) aims to be a market leader of micro-financing in Southeast Asia. Could it be that XOX will also provide micro-financing in the Southeast Asian region? This most likely could happen. The other director of Wetek is Liang Zeng. Both him and Leung Hao have good financial backgrounds.
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| Wetek director Liang Zeng |
Leung Hao is the chairman and CEO of Brilliant (Hong Kong) Holdings Ltd and looks after the overall strategic and international business development for the company. He is said to have an eye of identifying market opportunities across the globe with experience managing a cross-cultural team of management. He is also a supporter of start-ups as he believes in the opportunity with young people and great ideas. Leung started his career in the 1990s in the IT and mobile internet industry and founded Beijing Ruidong Technology Co. Ltd in 2013.
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| Wetek director Howard Leung |
Liang Zeng is an internet entrepreneur and venture capitalist. He invests and incubates the companies in digital marketing, artificial intelligence and enterprise services. He has held senior positions as senior vice-president (VP) of Kingdee International Software Group, VP of Microsoft Greater China, and most recently, VP of Baidu Inc. and chief executive officer of Baidu Nuomi.
Currently, he serves as board director and strategic advisor for multiple digital marketing and technology companies. Looking at the two directors' profile, they both seem to have strong links in Hong Kong and China Leung Hao said Wetek formed a partnership with XOX to ride on the latter's strong subscriber base. He said that apart from over 2.2 million subscribers, XOX has strong infrastructure in its dealership channels and technology to grow the relatively unserved market in Malaysia.
"This is a huge opportunity for Wetek to grow in this business. Globally, the microfinance industry had serviced 139.9 million borrowers in 2018, and 65 per cent of microfinance borrowers live in rural areas where traditional banking and lending is difficult or impossible. According to Microfinance Barometer 2019, this industry has been growing at an annual rate of 11.5 per cent over the past few years and projected to reach US$146.8 billion by 2021," he said.
"Micro financing is a good strategy to populate eWallet with funds especially in the challenging environment of eWallet adoption nationwide. Once eWallet subscribers have money in the ewallet, they can perform transactions through XOX Digital ecology," he added.
For XOX, this RM1 billion deal is set to boost the company's earnings in the current financial year ending September 30, 2020. XOX has been trading heavily since last week. Today, some 622 million shares exchanged hands. The stock rose in early morning trade to 12.5 sen today. At 5 p.m., it closed at 10.5 sen. Looks like the stock is going to head upward tomorrow.
According to the New Straits Times (NST) today in an online article, both the companies may issue a second tranche after the successful take-up of the initial RM1 billion. The NST qouted XOX CEO Ng Kok Heng stating that the company is moving into this direction to provide entrepreneurs and small business owners access to capital and expand their business. XOX will ride on its 2.2 million customer base for the business and the customer base is growing everyday.
XOX had a year ago proposed a rights issue with free warrants to raise up to RM66 million to fund its e-wallet and electronic SIM (e-SIM) businesses expansion. The company had allocated RM33 million of the proceeds raised from the rights issue to expand its e-wallet function by developing a new mobile application to support micropayments, the issuance of Mastercards and peer-to-peer e-money transfers. Some RM15 million was set aside for its e-SIM expansion as an alternative to the traditional SIM cards.
Looking at these initiatives, the subscriber base for XOX could exceed 3 million before the end of this year. The other director of Wetek is Liang Zeng, who is an internet entrepreneur and venture capitalist. Liang Zeng invests and incubates the companies in digital marketing, artificial intelligence and enterprise services. He has held senior positions as senior vice-president (VP) of Kingdee International Software Group, VP of Microsoft Greater China, and most recently, VP of Baidu Inc. and chief executive officer of Baidu Nuomi.
Currently, he serves as board director and strategic advisor for multiple digital marketing and technology companies.
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