Kabbage has announced the pricing of its first securitization of the year; the portfolio was valued at $525 million and includes small business loans; it is structured in four classes and has received ratings from Kroll Bond Rating Agency with the majority of the portfolio rated A; the deal is expected to close around March 20. Source
DecisionHawk seeks to provide a service for advising and educating small businesses on market financing options; the firm is led by entrepreneurs experienced in business owner consulting; they have released DecisionHawk, a software solution offering problem solving, education and collaboration; driven by big data analytics DecisionHawk can be used for a range of business decisions including: debt capital financing, equity capital financing, business insurance and business referrals. Source
OnDeck is one of the market's leading small business online lenders and they have taken an active role in industry self-regulation specifically around improved transparency for business borrowers; in their featured blog post they discuss the market's landscape and their lending technology partnership integration efforts; they also provide details on their involvement in developing industry best practices through development of the Association for Enterprise Opportunity and the Innovation Lending Platform Association; this involvement has resulted in the creation of the SMART Box which they also detail in their blog post. Sponsored Blog Post
Despite initial concerns over risks from Brexit, the UK's Funding Circle has been growing significantly; Funding Circle is one of four firms Bloomberg plans to follow throughout the Brexit process which will begin when Prime Minister Theresa May triggers Article 50 of the EU Treaty; for Funding Circle, results following the Brexit vote in June have been overwhelmingly positive; in the second half of 2016, originations increased 50% from 2015 to 530 million British pounds ($685 million) and in the fourth quarter of 2016 the firm's UK division reported its first net profit; while some funding challenges and employee visa risks still remain, the firm's business seems likely to continue its positive trajectory; low rates on fixed income investments in the UK and slowed bank lending to small businesses appear to continue as leading factors for the firm's growth. Source
The NFIB Small Business Optimism Index increased to 105.9 in January and reported its highest level since December 2004; in December 2016 the Index increased 7.4 points and has since continued to gain; small businesses have reported plans to increase workers and their optimism overall has been helped by policy proposals from the Trump administration. Source
The Coalition for Responsible Business Finance (CRBF) has announced it will join the Innovative Lending Platform Association (ILPA) in efforts to more broadly support lending for small businesses; the ILPA's network is primarily led by existing members, OnDeck, Kabbage and CAN Capital; with the merger of the two organizations, the ILPA will gain representation from the National Federation of Independent Business, the National Small Business Association, the Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council, the US Chamber of Commerce and the Association for Enterprise Opportunity; the expanded ILPA will provide even greater resources for advancing online small business lending education, advocacy and best practices; the ILPA is most well known for its work on introducing the SMART Box™ comparison tool for small business lenders; with the merger of the two organizations, the ILPA has also developed an updated industry code of ethics, leveraging the work previously done by the CRBF. Source
LendGenius is launching a new product to offer loan options for small businesses and to help increase education and awareness of small business credit availability; the company plans to launch its service in April 2017; the service will feature a dashboard of available loan offerings for companies based on their application profile; LendGenius has also worked extensively on building out the lender integration with the system which provides a range of API integrations and a comprehensive dashboard for reviewing borrowers; in the past four months the company reports over 30,000 requests for capital totaling over $8 million. Source
ApplePie Capital is the marketplace lending leader in franchise business loans; in their featured blog post, CEO Denise Thomas discusses the investment opportunity that the firm's platform presents and ApplePie Capital's business model; cites five reasons for investing in franchise debt including the stable, high single-digit to low double-digit returns with lower risk than many of the market's competing fixed income products. Sponsored Blog Post
Marketplace lender BlueVine has secured a $75 million credit line from Fortress Credit Corp. and funds managed by affiliates of Fortress Investment Group LLC; the firm provides online working capital financing for small and medium-sized businesses; it plans to use the financing to expand its working capital solutions and specifically its Flex Credit product. Source
After opening a search for a digital lending solution, the American Bankers Association has chosen Akouba; Lend Academy provides details in their article; Akouba offers banks a digital lending software solution for executing small business loans; it primarily works with community and regional banks; the ABA endorsement is a huge win for Akouba and will substantially add to its sales pipeline; the firm has 11 employees and has mainly been working with community banks reporting $500 million to $25 billion in assets; in addition to facilitating new business for Akouba, the ABA endorsement is also designed to help educate the market on advanced solutions for small business online lending; the ABA will be releasing a report on Akouba and the company will be holding a webinar on March 8 to discuss digitizing the small business lending process. Source