Mr. Fine’s work with Beijing-based Finup Credit Co. is part of a scramble to plug a gap in China: The world’s second-largest economy doesn’t have a widely accepted system to gauge creditworthiness among a fast-expanding middle class with growing paychecks, a hunger for consumer products and little or no credit history. Chinese household debt is growing rapidly, outpacing broad credit growth every year since 2013 and reaching 38 trillion yuan ($5.7 trillion) by the end of the second quarter of this year. But household debt remains relatively low by global standards, at about 44% of gross domestic product, and the absence of a widely used standard of creditworthiness is keeping consumer borrowing from growing even faster, hampering access to credit for some 500 million potential borrowers.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-missing-piece-in-chinas-economy-consumer-credit-ratings-1506304981