Good day, and thank you for standing by, and welcome to the Yiren Digital First Quarter 2021 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there'll be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star one. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I'll now hand the conference over to the first speaker today, Ms. Lydia Yu. Thank you. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Welcome to Yiren Digital's First Quarter 2021 Earnings Conference call. Today's call features a presentation by the Founder, Chairman, and CEO, CreditEase , and our CEO, Ning Tang, our SVP, Ms. Mei Zhao, and our CFO, Ms. Na Mei. Mr. Dennis Cong , our Director, will explain the presentation for today's session. Before proceeding, we will make forward-looking statements made under the safe harbor provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such statements are subject to risks, uncertainties, and factors that can cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in any such statements. Further information regarding potential risks and uncertainties factors is included in the company's filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The company does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements as required under applicable law.
During the call, we will be referring to several non-GAAP financial measures and supplemental measures to review with us our operating performance. These non-GAAP financial measures are not intended to be considered in isolation or as substitutes for financial information prepared and presented in accordance with U.S. GAAP. For information about these non-GAAP measures and reconciliations to GAAP measures, please refer to our earnings press release. I'll now pass on to Ning for opening remarks.
Thank you all for joining us today. With the completion of our business restructuring and spin-off of our legacy business, we have completed our transition to become a leading user-centric digital personal financial management platform. We delivered a solid quarter to start the year, resuming high-quality growth and returning to our normal profitability margin level. As we continue to focus on our strategic transition and business growth, we are constantly building and strengthening our key competitive edges along the way. Firstly, we have accumulated a considerable user base with over 5.3 million borrowers and 2.4 million investors whom we are reactivating. At the same time, we are also continuing to acquire new customers in our served segments through our established networks and partner channels.
Secondly, we have been making efforts in technology innovation and building up our data and tech-driven IT systems, coupled with AI, blockchain, and cloud computing to better serve our users and enhance our operation efficiency. Thirdly, we are enriching and broadening our product portfolio in both credit and wealth management to forge a full spectrum of financial products and services. Through all these moves, we are aiming to fully address our customers' financial needs in every stage of their lives, serving them through both online and offline channels with products and services ranging from credit to investment and insurance to help them better spend, better invest, and be better protected. This is how we are differentiated, and we believe we are on the right track to continue to expand our business model.
I will provide the business update on our wealth management side. I'll pass it over to Mei to give an update on our credit business. Our wealth management business continues to see stable growth. Client assets for investment products reached RMB 10.7 billion as of March 31st, 2021, representing an increase of 25% quarter-over-quarter. Total number of active investors stood at 307,000 as of March 31st, 2021, representing an increase of 32% from last quarter. The number of newly registered users coming from Yiren Wealth referral program in the first quarter this year grew by 22% from last quarter, indicating increasing trust and loyalty from existing investors in our brand and reputation. We are making meaningful achievements in increasing our investors' LTV.
In the first quarter of 2021, the number of investors who held more than two asset classes on Yiren Wealth grew by 630% from prior year, and the average client asset per investor increased by 65% quarter-over-quarter to RMB 85,000. Next, onto our insurance business. Hexiang Insurance Brokers, the growth momentum remains strong. We expanded our product portfolio into life insurance this quarter to fully tap into our customers' insurance needs. As well as the rollout of a new strategic platform initiative, in which leveraging on our insurance capabilities, we partner with traffic channels to provide scenario-based, data-driven product design, digitize the policy administration, and the distribution services. Using our partnership with the ski and snowboard platform as an example. Their platform helps users plan their next ski trip, book lessons, purchase equipment, and now sees a DAU of around 250,000.
We worked with our insurance partner to tailor a personal accident insurance plan specifically for sport-related incidents, and digitize their entire process from customer onboarding to underwriting and claims management, helping them realize an entirely new revenue stream. We will continue to open our platform to an increased number of channel partners to serve different consumption scenarios. Our digital stock brokerage platform is set for launch in the second quarter, which will offer offshore stock brokerage and financial services to retail investors, bringing additional synergies to our wealth management business. We note an ongoing trend of household assets in China increasingly being shifted from deposits to money market funds and equity assets, including stocks and futures, yielding their more attractive yield.
In addition, global capital markets are experiencing a sizable structural shift as trading volumes are hitting new highs in 2021 with increasingly strong participation from retail investors. This retail investing phenomena has taken off and accelerating, and our new initiative will allow us to seize the benefits from this market trend. Leveraging client resources and partnerships with CreditEase ecosystem, as well as our strong professional investment capabilities, the platform will target both mass affluent and high-net-worth customer segments and offer value-added services, including exclusive one-on-one consulting and financial information services. Now, I will turn the call over to Mei, who will highlight key updates for our credit business this quarter.
Thanks, Ning, and hello, everyone. I will now provide an update on our credit business. We continue to see solid business growth in the first quarter of 2021, following the three consecutive quarters of the growth in the loan volume, helping us to start a year strong. At the end of the first quarter, Yiren Credit registered users reached 95.8 million, increasing 8% year-on-year. Total number of the borrowers served in the first quarter reached close to 360,000 and increased up to 83% quarter-over-quarter. In the first quarter, Yiren Credit platform facilitated RMB 4.9 billion in loans under the loan facilitation model and increased up to 17% quarter-over-quarter and 565% year-on-year.
We are now focused on the two key strategic initiatives, which echo what Ning mentioned earlier on our positioning to be a leading user-centric digital personal financial management platform to meet our customers' diverse financial needs through offering the comprehensive suite of financial services. Firstly, we have been diversifying and enriching our products by consistently broadening our channel partners, and now we are covering a growing number of consumption scenarios, including traveling, shopping, social networking, entertainment, and education. With a mix of products offering from the secured and unsecured loan with various ticket size and tenures, offering through both online and offline channels, we have established a full credit product matrix to meet our customers' various credit needs.
Apart from 2C channels, we have also established partnerships with 2B companies such as third-party payment SaaS platforms and tax and financial management platforms, which help us to further drive up our scale. So far, we are working with more than 30 channel partners, and we are continuing to expand more external cooperation. Secondly, we started to work with Hexiang Insurance Brokers last year to offer life and property insurance products and services to our borrowers to better protect them and their families through both our online platform and offline national network of more than 200 stores. Insurance has now become a new driver of our credit business. Average premium per policy saw visible growth by 270% from August 2020 to April 2021, driven by increasing cross-sell and up-sell strategies.
You can see that by integrating different business lines, we have built a specific and inter-complementary ecosystem of financial services. On the operational front, we continue to achieve the cost efficiency and improve our product unit economics. For example, we see further decline in the customer acquisition cost as we broaden our products and services offering, thereby increasing the percentage of loan volume generated by repeat borrowers by 54% from prior quarters. Lastly, our risk performance. We have been stable and improving credit performance. As of March 31st of 2021, the delinquency rate for loans originated that are past due for 16 days-29 days, 30 days-59 days, and 60 days-89 days were 0.5%, 0.8%, and 0.6% respectively. Recovery in line to our historical lower levels.
In terms of risk management, we have improved collection rates through more refined asset management policy, enabling us to stabilize our delinquency rates at a healthy level. As a result, we expect our strong credit performance to continue throughout the year. With that, we will now pass it to our CFO, Na, who will provide a financial update.
Thank you, Mei. Hello, everyone. For financial update, I will focus on key items, our business operation and the financial performance only. You can refer to the detailed financial results in our early release on IR that has been posted on our website. First, our operating highlights. For our wealth management business, as of March 31st, 2021, we have served more than 2.4 billion investors, and the total number of active investors in our investment products grew to 307,107, increasing 32% quarter-over-quarter. Client assets in our investment products increased 25% quarter-over-quarter to RMB 10.7 billion as of March 31st, 2021. On the credit side, loan origination for the quarter was RMB 4.9 billion, representing an increase of 17% quarter-over-quarter. Q1 is our historical slowest quarter due to China holiday. We expect volume to further roll out in the following quarters. Onto our financial.
In the first quarter, total revenue increased 7% year-on-year to RMB 1.1 billion, of which 24% came from our wealth management business. Due to the rapid ramp up in our insurance business, revenue generated from Hexiang Insurance Brokers is now shown as insurance broker service in our P&L. We have also added a new financial service revenue line item, which represents revenue from our auto financial lease. Total expense decreased by 7% year-on-year to RMB 0.8 million. Selling and marketing expense decreased to 34% from prior year to RMB 405.2 million, mainly driven by increased operational efficiency. Our origination and service expense increased to 7% from prior year to RMB 174.5 billion, mainly due to an increase in commission expense paid to sales channel as a result of the extended insurance premiums.
Allowance for credit assets, receivables and others was RMB 141.2 billion this quarter, equivalent to 2.9% of loan volume as compared to 0.8% last quarter. Last quarter, we adjusted the allowance rate based on changed actual collection rate, which resulted in an allowance write-back. Excluding the write-back, the allowance rate of last quarter was 3.3%. The rate in Q1 2021 was better compared to last quarter. Net income for the quarter increased 843% from prior year to RMB 181.2 million. On the balance sheet side, our cash position remains strong, with RMB 2.6 billion of cash and short-term investments as of March 31st, 2021. Our strong balance sheet positions us well in the current operating environment and allow us to continue to employ new initiatives and tap into new opportunity. Finally, on business outlook.
For the full year 2021, our forecast remain at a range of RMB 20 million-RMB 30 million for the total investment product and RMB 20 billion-RMB 25 billion for the total loan facilitation. This forecast reflects our current and preliminary review of the marketing and operating conditions, which are subject to change. This concludes our closing remarks. Operator, we are waiting for Q&A.
Thank you. We now begin the question and answer session. If you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. If you wish to cancel your request, please press the pound hashtag. Once again, it is star one. Thank you. Once again, if you wish to ask a question, it is star one. Once again, it is star one. There's no more further questions at this time. I'd like to hand it back to today's presenters for closing remarks. Please go ahead.
Thank you everyone for joining the call today. This concludes our call for this quarter. Thank you.
Thank you. You may all disconnect. Have a great day and goodbye. Take care.