Pagaya is an asset manager based in New York; they announced that they have received $75 million in debt financing from Citi; the funds will be used for its Opportunity Fund to invest in loans by online lenders such as Prosper and LendingClub; the company uses machine learning to determine loans worthy of investment. Source
Citigroup led the $20 million round and the company is now worth $200 million; Citigroup plans to use the startup’s technology which uses natural language processing to improve customer interactions; the software converts audio conversations into text and then uses sentient analysis algorithms to detect questions, and whether it was a positive or negative interaction; it also works to determine bearish and bullish markets for traders. Source
Citigroup has a new small business loan offering offered through a branded partnership with Biz2Credit; the partnership follows new small business offerings from JPMorgan and Wells Fargo; Rohit Arora from Biz2Credit said the partnership has not been widely publicized because it is in very early stages; small business lenders use a website interface managed by Biz2Credit that submits their information to a Citigroup banker for follow up; Arora also said the new small business loan offering is part of the bank's Community Reinvestment Act obligations. Source
In this week’s PeerIQ Weekly Update the company covers the recent spate of bank earning reports, securitization news and issues another round of hiring updates; banks have seen a continued drop in fixed income and commodities trading revenue, picking up the slack has been lending and wealth management; Citigroup and Morgan Stanley had strong reports while Goldman Sachs and American Express missed the mark; SoFi is issuing a $720mn securitization deal, Moody’s rated the A classes AAA; PeerIQ also lists five new hires stemming from the $12mn round last summer. Source.
Citigroup will provide funding for mortgages which will eventually be securitized and sold; the terms of the deal were not disclosed; LendInvest has continued to grow loan volumes with 2017 volume at 500 million pounds. Source
As more and more fintechs disrupt the traditional banking sector, Citi is looking to embrace the new technological advances to ensure they stay relevant; the bank formed a Citi fintech division in November 2015 and stocked it with former employees of Amazon and PayPal; Citi is looking to launch a new version of their mobile app that will include voice and facial recognition to eliminate password entry; Stephen Bird, Citigroup's CEO of global consumer banking, recently told Fortune magazine, "what happens in an extinction phase is that you either rapidly adapt and new means of competition are created, or you go extinct."; the bank is looking to continue making advancements to keep up with industry tech trends. Source
No More Content