Red Envelopes go digital in the Internet era

Over 100 million people exchanged mobile 'lucky money' for Chinese New Year [Photo/Song Chen/China Daily]

Many Chinese spent the first hours of the year of the sheep bent down over their smartphones, obsessing over digital red envelopes – an incredible sight to disapproving elders. Alipay and Tencent even ignited an online red envelope war to win more users in the e-payment market.

On the CNN website, an article stated that in the old days, Chinese used to send blessings and lucky money in red envelopes (also called Hongbao) on the first day of the Lunar New Year, while this year Alibaba and Tencent have digitalized the traditional gifts. The Wall Street Journal commented that giving out and receiving e-lucky money has become a fashion among families and friends.

Statistics show that over 100 million people sent gifts of money via mobile apps during the holiday; about 3.27 billion trades have been completed on the Wechat e-payment platform. On New Year’s Eve, over 680 million people logged in to online Hongbao games on the website of Alipay. The number of Hongbao sent and received on Alipay amounted to 240 million with a total of 4 billion yuan (650 million U.S. dollars) sent.

The BBC attributes this trend to the transformation of modern society, particularly the rise of the Internet. Lianhe Zaobao, a Singapore-based Chinese-language newspaper, reported that the popularity of digital Hongbao drew people closer via the Internet, which turned the activity into a national entertainment.