Shivani Siroya is the CEO and founder of Tala; headquartered in San Francisco, the company has lending operations focused on the developing world having launched in Kenya in 2014; the company's app is the fifth most downloaded app in the country; Shivani shares her background, how the company got started, details on their lending product, and how they successfully serve those in developing countries. Source
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This page contains an archive of the Global Newsletter summaries and the weekly fintech news roundups.
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Bitcoin's price has been gaining in recent days; CNBC reports on its new high of $3,586.23 on Friday; over the weekend it continued to gain, surpassing $4,000; with the new highs the cryptocurrency’s value has gained over 24% in the past week and tripled in value for the year; its split into bitcoin and bitcoin cash has been a lead catalyst for its recent price gains; an additional upgrade called “segregated witness” is also being supported. Source
India has fast become one of the world's most interesting fintech markets; at LendIt USA 2017 we hosted a fireside chat focused on digital credit for the India population and how their biometric Aadhaar system plays a key role; a few key developments have helped the India population, the ease of acquiring a smartphone and the Aadhaar system; Aadhaar started with an investment by the India government eight years ago and today there is one billion Indians who have an Aadhaar number with key identifiable pieces of information; the government then began linking Aadhaar with the banking system and enlisted fintech firms to begin extending microloans to individuals and SMEs; Aadhaar helps to solve the biggest issue with lending, KYC, by using a retina scan or biometric signature to verify the borrower; the fireside chat also talked through how the lending process worked with Aadhaar and how it has helped to extend credit to a segment of the population that only a few years ago was unable to access capital. Source
In 2016 the online consumer lenders had an unexpected downturn; platforms experienced a capital markets crunch as well as concerns over credit quality; this panel with some of the largest consumer online lenders explores their expected growth going forward; despite the pullback, the major lenders continued to underwrite a significant amount of loans and believe growth for their businesses will return albeit in a more measured way; panelists discuss changing platform strategies and the focus on profitability. Source