Tencent-backed WeChat is in talks about developing a messaging service aimed at allowing international bankers to discuss bond trades with China-based bankers without breaching compliance rules that were implemented in the wake a series of high-profile rate-rigging scandals.
Many bankers in China trade bonds in WeChat message groups, where they agree on prices before executing trades and then registering them with the Chinese central bank’s trading system, according to people briefed on the process.
But international bankers are unable to participate because of strict internal compliance systems that bar such opaque and unregulated trading.