Trademark Use Draws Red Lines, Financial Marketing Sets Valves

No institution or individual may use trademarks containing financial attribute terms such as “finance,” “securities,” or “insurance” without obtaining the corresponding financial or financial information service qualifications or without the consent of financial regulatory authorities. Financial regulatory authorities, together with intellectual property administration authorities and market regulatory authorities, shall strengthen the monitoring and management of the use of such terms in trademarks... In order to regulate online marketing activities for financial products, protect the lawful rights and interests of financial consumers and investors, and promote the healthy and orderly development of Internet finance business, the People's Bank of China and seven other departments recently formulated the Measures for the Online Marketing Management of Financial Products (hereinafter “the Measures”), which will take effect on September 30, 2026.

As China's first comprehensive departmental rule specifically governing online marketing activities for financial products, the Measures contain seven chapters and 39 articles in total, establishing a systematic regulatory framework around marketing qualifications, marketing content and conduct, and cooperation between financial institutions and third-party internet platforms. Among them, Article 19 imposes restrictions on the use of trademarks containing financial-attribute terms, while Article 30 establishes a multi-department collaborative regulatory mechanism, deeply embedding trademark supervision into the financial governance system and achieving an institutional integration of intellectual property protection and online marketing management of financial products.

“In recent years, the China National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA) has vigorously promoted intellectual property financial work. Industries such as IP financing leases, trusts, pledge financing, securitization, and insurance have developed rapidly, and the integration of intellectual property with financial product marketing has become increasingly close. Given the professionalism and complexity of intellectual property, it is necessary for the CNIPA to participate in strengthening the management of online marketing of IP financial products,” said Song Hefa, a researcher and doctoral supervisor at the Institute of Science and Development, Chinese Academy of Sciences, in an interview with China Intellectual Property News.

“The intellectual property administration authorities have been deeply involved in the formulation of the Measures, embedding IP governance deeply into the financial regulatory framework. This reflects an institutional arrangement that cuts off the transmission path of illegal financial marketing from the source of trademarks,” said Lu Haijun, a professor and doctoral supervisor at the Law School of the University of International Business and Economics, in an interview with China Intellectual Property News. He noted that licensed operation is the bottom line of the financial industry, and trademarks and other commercial identifiers are the first point of contact for the public to identify financial services. By integrating IP and financial regulatory systems, the Measures transmit the licensed qualification requirement throughout the entire chain of trademark registration and use, filling previous regulatory gaps, and promoting cross-departmental collaborative governance toward normalization. This is an important measure for building a multi-stakeholder financial governance system.

Article 19 of the Measures imposes restrictions on the use of trademarks containing financial-attribute terms, clearly stipulating that no institution or individual may use trademarks containing such terms as “finance,” “financing,” “bank,” “exchange,” “asset management,” “fund,” “securities,” “insurance,” “trust,” and the like without obtaining the corresponding financial or financial information service qualifications or without the consent of financial regulatory authorities, unless the trademark as a whole has another meaning and is unlikely to mislead financial consumers and investors about its financial business qualifications.

“In new marketing models such as algorithm-based recommendations, live streaming, and short videos, account names and trademark identifiers are the core information perceived by users and are also the main vehicles through which illegal institutions mislead the public. The Measures proactively adapt to the communication characteristics of online marketing, regulating from the source of trademark use and setting a qualification ‘filter’ at the very beginning of marketing communication. This strengthens the rigid constraint of licensed operations and effectively blocks risks before they spread,” Lu Haijun said. He further noted that by using trademarks as a lever to regulate entity qualifications—restricting unlicensed entities from using financial-attribute trademarks—the Measures extend the licensed operation requirement to all aspects of commercial identifier use, reducing regulatory identification costs and consumer discrimination costs, curbing the survival space for illegal financial marketing at the source, and helping to achieve full-chain, full-coverage financial supervision.

In Song Hefa's view, Article 19 uses trademark use as an entry point to regulate online marketing of financial products. The underlying logic of this institutional design is to address the problem of misleading investors through illegal financial product marketing under the guise of trademark “outerwear,” and to safeguard the credibility of using trademarks for financial product marketing. It provides a solid institutional guarantee for combating illegal financial and wealth management marketing that exploits intellectual property rights, and is conducive to giving full play to the social governance function of the IP system in promoting fair competition and maintaining normal business order.

Article 30 of the Measures establishes a multi-department collaborative regulatory mechanism, specifying that financial regulatory authorities, together with intellectual property administration authorities and market regulatory authorities, shall strengthen the monitoring and management of the use of terms related to their respective fields in trademarks. Where any violation of Article 19 of the Measures is found, upon determination by the financial regulatory authorities, the intellectual property administration authorities and market regulatory authorities shall order corrective action within a prescribed period.

“Article 30 establishes a multi-department collaborative regulatory mechanism, which, from the perspective of public governance, has multi-dimensional innovative significance,” Lu Haijun said. He explained that from qualification verification at the trademark registration stage, to behavioral monitoring at the marketing communication stage, to joint enforcement at the violation stage, the Measures leverage information sharing and coordinated law enforcement across departments. This breaks the traditional separate regulatory approach, builds a new multi-stakeholder governance pattern involving financial, IP, and market regulatory authorities, forms a closed-loop regulatory process, and helps achieve a superimposed upgrading of governance effectiveness.

Song Hefa similarly believes that Article 30 provides for a collaborative regulatory mechanism among financial regulatory authorities, IP administration authorities, and market regulatory authorities, strengthening multi-department monitoring and management of the use of relevant terms in trademarks. With both division of labor and cooperation, it ensures comprehensive coverage while preventing regulatory blind spots. This is an important institutional innovation that significantly enhances the public governance effectiveness of using the IP system to regulate online marketing of financial products.

“Financial institutions should conduct a comprehensive compliance review of their trademarks and account names as soon as possible, establish a joint review mechanism linking marketing content and trademark qualifications, and ensure that marketing activities are consistent with the scope of their licensed operations. Third-party internet platforms should fulfill their platform governance responsibilities, improve the qualification verification process for financial marketing entities, and promptly remove non-compliant identifiers used by unlicensed entities,” Lu Haijun suggested. He further expressed the hope that the future will see more detailed examination standards and usage rules for trademarks containing financial-attribute terms, clarification of the specific collaborative working procedures, information-sharing scope, and law enforcement coordination standards, and the establishment of normalized multi-department information-sharing channels to enhance the operability of the system.