MORE than 2.5 million users have bought the Tianhong Zenglibao monetary market fund through their Alipay accounts after it was launched by the latter nearly three weeks ago.

The users have transferred more than 6.6 billion yuan (US$1.1 billion) into the market fund which may help them earn a return from investments made by the mutual fund.

Hanggzhou-based Alipay, China's largest third party payment platform, said in a statement yesterday that so far up to 1.6 million payments for online orders on Taobao have been made from the mutual fund accounts held by Alipay users.

The China Securities Depository and Clearing Co Ltd said 44.2 million domestic investors have opened mutual fund accounts by the end of May.

Third party payment service in China only accounts for under 1 percent of total non-cash payment in the first quarter of this year, according to a senior official at the People's Bank of China.