Walmart partnered with Even and PayActiv to provide a set of products for their more than 1.4 million employees; employees will be able to access earned weaves ahead of schedule using an Instapay feature; “We’re investing to give our people financial tools that help provide more stability in their lives, which we believe will empower them to be all they can be when they are at work serving our customers,” explained Jacqui Canney, Walmart’s Chief People Officer; Walmart is covering the cost of Even’s tool and it will allow for employees to access Instapay eight times a year for free. Source.
News Roundup
This page contains an archive of the Global Newsletter summaries and the weekly fintech news roundups.
Every day the Fintech Nexus news team scours the globe for the most important stories of the day to include in our daily newsletter.
Then every Saturday we bring you our weekly news roundup of the top 10 fintech stories of the week with commentary from Peter Renton.
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The Financial Times reviews company and loan performance at various online lenders; shares that Shanda Group bought more shares of LendingClub after forecasts were adjusted last week; LendingClub also recently stopped making F & G grade loans available to investors; broadly, delinquency rates have increased across online lenders; valuations of other companies such as Earnest and Prosper have also been affected. Source
About 4.6 million people are currently in default on student loans which is more than double the number from 4 years ago; the number grew by almost 275,000 borrowers in the third quarter alone; even as the economy grows and there is a multitude of options available to borrowers more people fall behind. Source.
The round was led by Grupo Coppel with participation from FirstMark Capital, Revolution Ventures and Colchis Capital; INSIKT has facilitated 125,000 loans over the course of three years; their white-label product provides an alternative to payday loans and is currently used by 600 banks and credit unions; funds will be used to expand to new states and internationally. Source
With regulatory changes in China the online lender LexinFintech scaled back their IPO target from $500mn to $120mn; the company is looking to IPO next week and is offering 12 million shares at a price range of $9 to $11; recent IPOs by Chinese fintechs like Qudian have seen a significant drop in value after the regulatory push in China. Source.
Two years ago John Hancock acquired AI startup Guide Financial that helped to set the stage for their newly released robo-advisor Twine; “We weren’t going to be a Vanguard, and on the other hand, there are actors like Robinhood — we landed somewhere in the middle,” said Barbara Goose, John Hancock’s chief marketing officer as reported by Tearsheet; the company is completely separate from John Hancock, in technology stack and management, though they do coordinate with the firm through their innovation officer; allowing Twine to be separate but still connected to the main firm gives them flexibility and allow them to target their millennial customer. Source.
Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne is exploring options to sell the retailer and use the proceeds to start a digital global property registry; Mr. Byrne would be teaming up with Hernando de Soto who says that formalizing land rights can help to stop poverty; they are looking to use the blockchain to list ownership records, this would make it easier to trace them back to the right owner and account for less forgeries; the new company, De Soto, would start in early 2018 and use more than 10 Overstock employees. Source.
American Banker shares a slideshow of the various moves banks have made in consumer lending this year; some banks featured include Barclays, PNC, Capital One and TCF. Source
- Braviant Holdings Announces Launch of Chorus Credit Personal Loans
- Kasisto Raises $17M in Series B Funding
- Lion Rock Fintech Raises HK$50M in Funding
- PPDai and Sun Hung Kai & Co Announce Joint Cooperation
- South Korean Banks Drop Crypto Accounts as Government Plans a Ban
- Regions Bank Increases Prime Lending Rate
- Moody's: Some consumer ABS sectors to have weaker collateral performance due to pockets of borrower stress and weaker underwriting
- USAA’s Heather Cox is blurring the lines between business and technology
- Can a BBVA spinoff crack the digital ID code?
- Bitcoin: Electrifying Investment, Lousy Currency
The $5tn mutual fund manager announced that they have successfully tested blockchain technology to automatically update data on index funds; types of data in the test included names and share prices of companies in index funds; the company stated they are not looking to blockchain to replace workers but give them more freedom to focus on other tasks; Vanguard follows other big name firms who have tested uses of the technology recently. Source.