Ant Group’s online lender MYbank is launching a flood of credit to provide short-term financing for merchants during Alibaba’s upcoming “Double Eleven” online shopping extravaganza.

The 5-year-old online bank said it will provide 400 billion yuan ($60 billion) of collateral-free loans to businesses as they gear up for the online shopping festival that falls on Nov. 11, MYbank said in a statement on Wednesday.

As part of the program, MYbank will extend 200 billion yuan of short-term loans to poorly-funded small vendors, enabling them to receive payments in full once consumers place pre-orders. It said the move could shorten the payment cycle and turnover by up to about 20 days.

The program comes at a time when consumption continues to recover from the Covid-19 pandemic as the Chinese government steps up efforts to revive the world’s second-largest economy from its pandemic-induced slowdown.

“For many small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) across China, the Double Eleven festival this year has added significance and presents an important opportunity to strengthen business continuity and growth,” MYbank president Jin Xiaolong said in a statement.

Some 800 million consumers are expected to participate in this year’s online shopping festival which will feature more than 250,000 brands, Alibaba said in a statement emailed to Caixin.

MYbank differentiates itself from traditional commercial banks by using cloud technology to reduce financing costs and fast-track the loan approval process for SMEs, which have accounted for about 60% of China’s gross domestic product (GDP) in recent years.

Contact reporter Ding Yi (yiding@caixin.com)

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