Beijing and Shanghai top the country in intelligent financial development, an influential report said.

The Chinese capital and the country's financial center are followed by East China's Jiangsu province, Tianjin municipality and Guangdong province in South China, according to The CF 40 China Intelligent Financial Development Report 2020.

The report, which was published in Nansha district, Guangzhou, Wednesday, is the result of research in the key project of The China Finance 40 Forum's China Intelligent Financial Development Report 2020.

The key members of the project, which is led by Xiao Gang, former head of the China Securities Regulatory Commission, include senior researchers from the China Finance 40 Forum along with researchers and experts from the science and technology departments, financial regulatory departments and more than 20 well-known financial institutions, university think tanks and science and technology companies.

Xiao said artificial intelligence has now been widely used in the country's financial sector, and the deep integration of artificial intelligence technology and the financial industry will reshape the financial value chain and financial ecology, expand the breadth and depth of financial services, and further promote reform of the financial model.

Xu Xianchun, former deputy director of the National Bureau of Statistics, said intelligent financial development is unbalanced in the country.

Most of the municipalities and provinces that enjoy rapid development of intelligent finance are situated in the eastern and southern coastal areas where economic development is faster than the country's inland areas, Xu said. Many inland provinces and regions still lag far behind the eastern and southern coastal areas in intelligent financial development, he said.

Coastal provinces and municipalities should further raise their performance and efficiency while boosting their intelligent financial development in the years to come, Xu said.

Guangdong, one of China's economic powerhouses and home to many artificial intelligent companies, has great potential in intelligent financial development. Guangdong has the country's best ecological environment for intelligent financial development, he said.

Xu said that while giving full play to its advantages, the province should pay special attention to encourage intelligent finance to serve the real economy. "Therefore, Guangdong should further improve the performance of intelligent finance to serve the real economy and reserve talents in the years to come.

"Now financial technology and digitization have become an important engine of economic development, and relevant departments should continue to strengthen technology research and development in frontier fields－including artificial intelligence industry－accelerate the development of financial technology and intelligence and serve the construction of China's modern industrial system in the coming years," he said.