Last week I chatted with Mike Cagney, CEO of SoFi, to talk about recent developments with their student loan platform....
SoFi has faced challenges of opposition to its industrial loan charter from numerous parties for various reasons; now California Representative Maxine Waters, a Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee, has written a letter to the FDIC calling for a public hearing to more broadly discuss the online lenders application and its market implications; fintech regulation is an ongoing topic for debate and Waters says, "Granting SoFi's application would set a precedent that a wide variety of other fintech companies may choose to follow even though concerns related to financial inclusion, consumer benefits, supervision, and regulation of such entities are still unresolved."; the industrial loan charter would give SoFi a number of advantages including the allowance for FDIC insured deposits with no supervisory reporting requirements at the holding company level; Waters also commented on the development of the OCC's special purpose national charter for fintech companies which would grant internet lenders nationwide business approval in a single charter, stating that the framework has not been fully developed for implementation; the industrial loan company charter is currently limited to business in the states of California, Colorado, Minnesota, Indiana, Hawaii, Nevada and Utah. Source
SoFi continues to set itself apart not just from traditional finance institutions such as big banks that it is looking...
In this week’s PeerIQ Industry Update they cover the recent rebound of equity markets after a volatile few weeks, regulatory news and a deep dive on fintech M&A; OnDeck announced they had reached GAAP profitability and it was reported that SoFi missed their internal targets; PeerIQ takes a deep dive on why banks should buy online lenders; some of the key reasons inclined ROE potential for the banks and to avoid potentially losing market share to big tech firms who might enter the space in the next few years. Source.
Last week the New York Federal Reserve President, William Dudley, gave a briefing on household debt with a particular focus...
Sofi's student loan volumes are down, but analysts showed excitement about the company's growth in deposits.
The rumors that have been flowing for many months have been confirmed. Leading fintech company, SoFi, has acquired naming rights...
SoFi has received preliminary ratings from Kroll Bond Rating Agency for a securitization portfolio including prime jumbo residential mortgage loans; the securitization includes 36 classes with 270 mortgage loans; 31 classes are rated AAA; the remaining classes are rated AA to B with one unrated class accounting for $1 million of the portfolio; the portfolio includes high quality mortgage loans with a comprehensive weighted average credit score of 777; the total principal balance of the portfolio is $168,790,946. Source
SoFi CEO Anthony Noto said the company is looking at potentially adding safeguards to day trading to ensure users are...
Renren, a publicly listed company in the US operates a social media platform in China but has also made several fintech investments; investments include LendingHome, Fundrise, Motif Investing as well as a significant stake in SoFi; a year ago Renren announced plans to spin off its minority venture stakes into a new subsidiary; under the plan retail investors would receive a cash payout, losing their exposure to SoFi; Ryan Roberts, director at MCM Partners stated in the Forbes article, “It certainly looks like Joe Chen is trying to strip the best assets from Renren, particularly SoFi. SoFi is basically the entire value of the company right now, the core business has really deteriorated.” Source