Kiwoom’s MTS Boasts More Than 3mn MAUs
The author is an analyst of NH Investment & Securities. He can be reached at junsup@nhqv.com. -- Ed.
With Korea’s leading fintech securities having set their eyes firmly onto the domestic brokerage market, we note that Kiwoom Securities’ mobile trading system (MTS) has accumulated more than 3mn MAUs. Accordingly, the chances appear to be growing stronger that Kiwoom’s MTS will ultimately evolve into a comprehensive financial platform down the road.
Kiwoom’s MTS boasts more than 3mn MAUs
With Kiwoom Securities’ mobile trading system (MTS) having been garnering higher traffic since early-2020, its average January~February MAU this year jumped 142% y-y to 3.1mn. This MAU figure not only largely outnumbers that for competing securities MTSs, but also is higher than user numbers for Korea’s major fintech apps (Payco: 2.45mn; Bank Salad: 1.28mn).
Moreover, Kiwoom’s MTS usage hours have also risen steeply. Amidst heightened stock market volatility following Covid-19 breakout, MTS-using retail investors tend to spend more time on MTSs. The average usage time per month on Kiwoom’s MTS expanded 35% y-y to 586 minutes over January and February, this year.
Expectations rising towards evolution as financial platform player
In the domestic market, competition has been intensifying between securities firms and fintech companies to secure the initiative inthe financial platform market.In 2021, taking advantage of accumulated MAUs from their popular easy money transfer services, Korea’s representative fintech firms (Kakao Pay Securities and Toss Securities) are set to commence mobile securities trading services. We believe that the entries of fintech players into the brokerage market will be felt the strongest by Kiwoom Securities, given its standing as the number-one player in the online brokerage market.
That said, the sharp climb in MTS traffic amidst the stock trading boom since early-2020 should help Kiwoom and other traditional securities to defend their M/S against attacks by fintech companies. In addition, this increase in MTS traffic might be a good opportunity for traditional securities to establish their presence in the financial platform arena.
Needs heavy effort to secure leadership in financial platform market
This year, Kiwoom is to launch new asset management services and to carry out MTS renewal in order to solidify its dominance in the retail brokerage market. Kiwoom stands as the first among traditional securities players to take actionin response to the emergence of the financial platform market. That said, for the firm to carve out a solid presence in the new market, we believe that it needs to devise various measures for boosting traffic.