Vanguard gave up on mutual funds in China, but working with Ant

BEIJING — Vanguard’s experiment with financial technology in China is showing early signs of success.

In less than a year, more than 1 million users have signed up for “BangNiTou,” a smartphone-based investment advisory product run through the American mutual fund giant’s joint venture with Alibaba-affiliate Ant Group.

That’s according to a release from BangNiTou on Thursday, just four days after Vanguard said it would drop its own pursuit of a mutual fund license in China. Instead, the company plans to focus on its…