Market Loop - 👗TikTok launches ecommerce in the UK

SOCIAL MEDIA
TikTok launches ecommerce in the UK 

What’s going on?
Yesterday TikTok introduced its first live shopping and entertainment event where users could buy products straight from the platform.

Why is this important?

Shopping with the help of social media, so called social shopping, is a fast-growing trend. 

China gives an insight into how lucrative it can be. In October, an internet celebrity known as “The Lipstick King” sold an incredible $1.7bn of beauty products during a 12-hour livestream on a Chinese video app.

Facebook and Instagram have been allowing consumers to buy products on their platforms for years and now TikTok wants in on the action.

The short video sharing app has taken the world by storm since launching five years ago, hitting 1bn users in record time.

TikTok’s first shopping event featured offers and discounts by beauty and tech brands like Charlotte Tilbury, L’Oréal and Nutri Bullet as well as entertainment from creators and musicians.

Takeaway
Social shopping is set to be a huge feature of ecommerce taking the traditional format of QVC to a new audience online. With the prize so big, the field is crowded with Facebook, Snapchat and YouTube all launching livestream products and providing further competition for high street retailers.

FINTECH
Monzo raises $500m

Yesterday Monzo announced that it has raised $500m, taking its valuation to $4.5bn. It’s now Europe’s third most valuable digital bank, behind Revolut ($33bn) and N26 ($9bn). 

Since launching in 2015 the app-based challenger bank has amassed 5m UK users to become the largest digital banking provider in the country.

The cash injection will fund the roll out of new products including a buy-now-pay-later service and a trading platform.

The news caps off what has been a difficult year for the bank.

It issued two warnings about its ability to survive as a business after reporting a £115m loss in the past year.

It is under investigation by financial regulators for its money-laundering measures after failing to spot nearly £10m in customer fraud.

Then in October it announced that it had pulled out of applying for a US banking license almost two years after starting the process.