Xiaomi’s move comes after Chinese tech peers like Alibaba Group Holding Ltd and Tencent Holdings Ltd have already established a beachhead in the India internet finance sector via investments.

It is also the latest push by Xiaomi, which has been the top smartphone vendor in India for nine consecutive quarters, to leverage its sizable local user base to offer more internet services.

Xiaomi said it is launching Mi Credit, a marketplace for digital lending, which offers users credit between 5,000 Indian rupees ($70) and 100,000 Indian rupees at low interest rates.

It has partnered with a number of local startups, such as Bengaluru-based ZestMoney, CreditVidya, Money View, Aditya Birla Finance Ltd and EarlySalary, to determine who should get credit and then finance it, according to a report by tech news website Tech-Crunch.

Xiaomi said earlier that it has shipped more than 100 million smartphones in India. Xiaomi has been operating its lending business in its home turf for some time. In mid-2018, its financial services’ lending business stood at a loan book of $8 billion with $2 billion in outstanding balances.

Xiaomi is not the first Chinese company that is eyeing the Indian internet finance market. Ant Financial, the finance arm of Alibaba, has invested in Paytm, the largest mobile payment platform in India. Tencent has also reportedly bought a minority stake in Policybazaar.com, an Indian online insurance aggregator.

The rising enthusiasm in India came amid the rapid penetration of smartphones in India, serving as a sound digital foundation to support a booming internet finance market. The digital lending sector alone in India is expected to be worth about $1 trillion by 2023, according to market research company Boston Consulting Group.

Li Chao, an analyst at Beijing-based research firm iResearch Consulting Group, said Xiaomi can pre-install internet finance apps on its smartphones, which is the biggest advantage of the company.

The millions of current users of its handsets are also a large potential consumer group for its lending business. But it still faces mounting competition, Li said.

Xiaomi’s adjusted net profit grew 20.3 percent year-on-year in the third quarter of this year, to 3.5 billion yuan, while total revenue rose 5.5 percent year-on-year to 53.7 billion yuan ($7.6 billion). Its overseas business has continued to grow rapidly, with revenue rising 17.2 percent year-on-year to 26.1 billion yuan and accounting for 48.7 percent of the total revenue.

North Korea will hold a plenary meeting around the end of December to decide on “crucial issues,” its state-run news agency said Wednesday.

On the same day, the Korean Central News Agency reported that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un rode up Paektusan on a white horse accompanied by military commanders, raising speculation that the communist regime may take more provocative military actions as the year-end deadline it set for denuclearization talks with the US quickly approaches.

North Korea’s Workers’ Party of Korea announced Tuesday that the 5th Plenary Meeting of the 7th Central Committee of the WPK would convene around the end of December, Korea Central News Agency reported, “in order to discuss and decide on crucial issues in line with the needs of the development of the Korean revolution and the changed situation at home and abroad.”

The last plenary meeting was held in April, where the North Korean leader urged the US to come up with a new proposal for denuclearization negotiations and set a year-end deadline. Kim also warned that he would take a “new way” if Washington fails to offer an acceptable proposal.

The announcement of the meeting comes as the North Korean leader was reported to have ridden up Paektusan on a white horse.

Accompanied by commanding officers, Kim recollected the “bloody history of guerrillas who recorded dignity on the first page of the history of the Korean revolution by shedding their blood in the vast plain of Mt. Paektu,” the KCNA said.

Choe Ryong-hae, the president of the Presidium of the Supreme People’s Assembly and Pyongyang’s second in command, and Gen. Park Jong-chon, the chief of the Korean People’s Army, were among Kim’s retinue, according to the KCNA.

Kim’s visit to Paektusan marks the second time this year. On Oct. 16, the North Korean leader was photographed riding a white horse on the mountain, where he reportedly stressed the importance of self-reliance against outside forces, including the US. The mountain holds symbolic importance for the regime, which claims it as the birthplace of the late former leader Kim Jong-il, the father of Kim Jong-un, as part of the mythology surrounding the Kim regime.

The Unification Ministry said it is not unusual for Pyongyang to convene the meeting.

“North Korea’s regulation stipulates it hold the plenary meeting at least once in a year,” Unification Ministry Spokesperson Lee Sang-min said at Wednesday’s regular briefing.

“And Pyongyang has been seen holding the meeting twice a year, or even four times in a year in the past. So I don’t think convening the meeting is unusual.”

As the meeting is held just before the New Year’s speech by Kim Jong-un, Lee said the ministry will closely watch the situation.

As the year-end deadline approaches, both Washington and Pyongyang are seen to ramp up pressure against each other. US President Donald Trump hinted that the US can use military force against the North as necessary, though he reiterated that his personal relationship with the North Korean leader remains good.

“Now we have the most powerful military we’ve ever had and we’re by far the most powerful country in the world,” Trump told reporters in London, where he is attending a meeting of North Atlantic Treaty Organization leaders.

“And, hopefully, we don’t have to use it, but if we do, we’ll use it. If we have to, we’ll do it,” he said.

Earlier on the same day, the North’s Vice Foreign Minister Ri Thae-song issued a statement warning the US against using their denuclearization negotiations to influence domestic politics. He also said it is entirely up to the US to select what “Christmas gift” it will get.

Kim Dong-yub, a professor at Kyungnam University’s North Korean Studies School, said North Korea may possibly break away from the negotiations with the US and choose a “new way.”

“The North Korean party’s plenary meeting is a very important event for the regime. In the New Year’s speech, I believe Pyongyang will reconfirm its status as a nuclear power and highlight reinforcing its self-defense capabilities,” Kim said.

“Domestically, Kim will announce a new strategy encouraging self-rehabilitation for economic development. Externally, North Korea will break away from negotiating with the US and seek for a new way of cooperating with China and Russia,” Kim said.

The Thailand Trade and Economic Office (TTEO) in Taipei implemented the new visa application scheme Nov. 30, with individual travelers holding Republic of China (Taiwan) passports required to apply for their visa online and schedule an appointment to submit their passport in person at the Thai representative office.

Previously, individual Taiwanese travelers could go directly to the TTEO at any time to apply for a tourist visa without having to fill out an online form and make a prior appointment.

Opposition Kuomintang (KMT) legislators on Monday demanded that MOFA file a protest over what they described as a tightening of the visa application process.

Tseng Ming-ching (曾銘宗), KMT caucus whip, pointed out at a press conference that while the Taiwan government grants visa-free privileges to Thai visitors, the Thai government does not reciprocate.

Regarding the complaints, MOFA said in a statement late Monday that it understands the sentiment of the general public and has already conveyed dissatisfaction to the Thai government.

“We have asked the Thai side to clarify the new process and will continue to urge it to improve the convenience of visa applications for Taiwanese,” the statement said.

MOFA also defended Taiwan’s visa-free privileges for visitors from Thailand, arguing that the policy has resulted in a growth in the number of Thai tourists, as well as educational and business exchanges between the two sides. It did not provide statistics.

Meanwhile, the Thai representative office issued a public notice on Monday clarifying that the new e-visa scheme is not directed only at Taiwan but also to visa applicants from other countries, such as the United Kingdom and France.

Although tourists from these countries enjoy visa-free entry privileges for tourism purpose, they still need to go through the same e-visa application process when they apply for student, business or marriage visas, a TTEO official told CNA.

The new e-visa scheme also requires applicants to submit bank details for the last three months as proof that they can cover their travel expenses, a measure that has angered some Taiwanese people.

KMT Legislator Apollo Chen (陳學聖) said the requirement is tantamount to treating Taiwan as a third-world country.

Iraq, which has the worst record among major producers of implementing the group’s current supply deal, pushed for steeper cutbacks. Oil Minister Thamir Ghadhban said the group should remove another 400,000 barrels a day from the market, taking the total reduction to 1.6 million. Upon arrival in the Austrian capital late on Tuesday, he told reporters that he believed Saudi Arabia, OPEC’s defacto leader, also supported the move.

However, an earlier meeting of the group’s Joint Technical Committee, which advises ministers but doesn’t make final decisions, didn’t discuss steeper cutbacks, said delegates, who asked not to be named because the talks were private. The group’s main aim is to agree an extension of the existing deal beyond March, for which there is a consensus among the Gulf Arab members, Oman’s Oil Minister Mohammed Al Rumhi told reporters in Dubai on Wednesday.

Ministers from other nations including Saudi Arabia and Kuwait are scheduled to arrive in Vienna later on Wednesday.

“Iraq is the main OPEC country missing its compliance target,” Olivier Jakob, managing director of consultant Petromatrix GmbH, said in a note to clients. “Yet it is continuously repeating that OPEC could consider an increase in the size of the cut.”

An alliance between the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and several non-members including Russia and Kazakhstan has been restraining output since the start of 2017 in order to eliminate a surplus and bolster crude prices. The agreement expires at the end of March and ministers must decide what to do next. The vast majority of analysts and traders surveyed by Bloomberg considered an extension to be the most likely outcome of ministerial talks on Dec. 5 to 6.

In 2020 the group faces slowing demand growth and another huge expansion in rival production, which together could create another oversupply that drives international prices back down toward $50 a barrel.

“It has been calculated that the 1.2 million has proved not enough so an additional cut is required” because demand growth is slowing, Ghadhban said. “This is not yet final, it’s very much subject to the member countries.”

In reality, OPEC+ has gone deeper than the pledged 1.2 million cut due to a combination of voluntary and involuntary measures. The JTC concluded that the group exceeded that target by about 40% in October, meaning the additional cuts Iraq is proposing are already in place, albeit unofficially.

Saudi Arabia, wishing to lead by example, has pumped well below its quota for the duration of the agreement. Other nations including Angola, Venezuela and Mexico have simply been unable to sustain their production due to industry mismanagement or years of under-investment.

“Saudi Arabia could easily reduce its official production allowance by 300,000 barrels a day without affecting its actual production,” said Jakob of Petromatrix, which is based in Zug, Switzerland. “A cosmetic cut might feed some automated buying on headlines but that would be a rally hard to sustain.”

The kingdom’s extra efforts have offset lax implementation of output reductions by several other nations. On average this year, Russia has implemented just 72% of its pledged cuts, while Nigeria and Iraq have actually increased output, according to data from the International Energy Agency.

Ghadhban said Iraq is striving to fulfill its part of the OPEC+ agreement and emphasized that every country should share the burden. Yet the production figure he gave for his country of 4.6 million barrels a day showed that 11 months into the deal he’s implemented barely a third of his agreed cuts.

There are signs that this week’s meeting could deliver a showdown between Saudi Arabia and these laggards, because the kingdom is no longer willing to bear the extra burden.

Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak appeared to preempt this debate, saying he would ask to discuss a rule change that would exclude his country’s production of a light oil called condensate from its target. Russia has exceeded its quota in all but three months of 2019, but that accounting change would bring output in line with its target.