Morgan Stanley reported better than expected quarterly results, bolstered by strong performances from its trading and investment banking businesses. Compared to the same period last year, sales rose 19.7 per cent while bond-trading revenue moved from US$873 million to US$1.7 billion, CNBC reports. In contrast, Goldman Sachs had rattled analysts a day earlier, with its first earnings miss since 2015, weighed down by flat sales from bond, currency and commodities trading and a six per cent drop in equities trading revenue. Sale of an "unauthorised" wealth management product to around 100 high net worth customers of Minsheng Bank, China's biggest privately owned bank, has set off investigations into a possible A$500 million fraud, Caixin reports. It seems a commercial acceptance bill had been guaranteed by a sub-branch of Minsheng Bank as a banker's acceptance bill because it was stamped with the branch's corporate seal. The seal basically put the bank in the position of promising to pay back the loan for the company, subsequently discovered to be a forgery. A new study by the UN-based Better Than Cash Alliance reveals that Alipay and WeChat Pay enabled US$2.9 trillion in Chinese digital payments in 2016. This was a 20-fold increase in the past four years. The data shows that digital payments, using existing platforms and networks, provide access to a wider range of digital financial services, expanding financial inclusion and economic opportunity throughout China and neighbouring countries. The report's proponents assert it "contains key lessons to help other countries include more people in the economy by transitioning from cash to digital payments".