17 ASIAN LEGAL BUSINESS CHINA • 亚洲法律杂志-中国版 WWW.LEGALBUSINESSONLINE.COM/CHINA recorded as fixed assets in its balance sheet.” The Interim Provisions come into effect in 2024. The third milestone is the establishment of the National Data Administration at the end of October 2023. “It is a national-level agency for the management and collaborative promotion of data, and one of its responsibilities is to facilitate data flow.” With this, Zou says that the foundation for data assetization has been established, and “is rather advanced even at the global level, which is a classic example of government-promoted digital economy development.” DATA TRADING MARKET Although the value of data has only recently been recognized at the regulatory level, their commercial value has long been appreciated and transactions targeting data have become extremely common. Dora You, head of data compliance and counsel at Yuanda Winston, points out that according to the 2023 China Data Transaction Market Research and Analysis Report, the size of China’s data trading industry reached 87.68 billion yuan in 2022, accounting for 13.4 percent of the global total and 66.5 percent of the market in Asia. “However, exchange trading and over-the-counter trading paint two completely different pictures. Based on estimates from relevant research institutes, in 2022, proper data trading on data exchanges accounted for only 2 to 3 percent of all transactions.” Geographically, East and South China are the most active when it comes to data trading at present. Referring to the report mentioned above, You explains that “first, the financial markets in East and South China are more advanced, and financial industry players, such as securities brokers, insurance companies and banks, are the main parties requiring data. Second, the Internet industry in East and South China is also quite mature, laying the foundation for the data trading market in terms of technology, software, hardware, etc.” Further, the report mentions that digital trading is becoming increasingly active in Southwest China because “it has relatively robust data centre infrastructure, and the Guiyang Data Exchange, one of the most representative industry players, has a leading position on exchange data trading in terms of trading volume.” Zuo Kun, partner and head of data compliance of Lianyue Law Firm, is also keeping close tabs on the development of exchange and OTC data trading. According to him, some data markets, such as financial information, e-commerce transactions, short video traffic databases, etc., are already relatively mature after a long period of development, while other industries “are still in the development stage in terms of data trading. No broad consensus has been reached among market players on matters such as the data prices, the evaluation system, etc.” In terms of trading volume, while statistics for OTC trading are hard to come by, exchange trading has seen “significant development in the Yangtze River Delta region and the Pearl River Delta region in 2023.” Zuo shares that, for example, the Shanghai Data Exchange has launched many data products related to the financial industry by leveraging local resource advantages, the Guangzhou Data Exchange focuses on the integration of data and the manufacturing industry, while “data exchanges in other cities such as Guiyang, Shenzhen and Beijing are also promoting data trading based on their own unique resources and local policy environment.” Shihui Partners has been providing legal support for the development of trading on data exchanges, including legislative support for the local data regulations in multiple regions, support for the study of data exchange rules, and support for the first batch of projects listed on the Shanghai Data Exchange. Raymond Wang, partner of Shihui, tells ALB that currently, Stateowned enterprises and banks are the most enthusiastic on the supply side for exchange trading, while some large private enterprises are also involved in the first batch of trading projects. Wang says that due to the significant uncertainty in the concept of exchange data trading, one of the important tasks of lawyers is to discuss with clients which data are suitable for trading. “The DATA COMPLIANCE Jiang Xiangyu 江翔宇 Zou Danli 邹丹莉 Zuo Kun 左昆 Raymond Wang 王新锐 Dora You 尤白璐
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