Boston-based Eastern Bank hired a former Capital One executive, Dan O'Malley, to help the bank learn how it can compete with the growing online lending industry; through his research Dan learned that 5% of Eastern's business customers used an online lender and the primary reason for this was quick access to capital; Eastern now has a competing product to offer small business customers and has even begun to license out their technology to fellow banks; Eastern believes their credit scorecard will allow for banks to utilize their new technology more than they would with an online lender because of their adherence to banking regulations. Source
Yesterday morning, four fintech experts joined a Lendit panel to discuss Buy Now Pay later: how to lay the foundations for a successful BNPL offering.
ID Analytics introduced the Online Lending Network in October 2016 with the goal of providing greater resources to lenders for mitigating fraud; Online Lending Network members access internetwork supplied data and information from ID Analytics for greater detection of fraudulent loan applications and loan stacking; ID Analytics reports that the network has achieved visibility into 75% of US domestic marketplace lending activity since inception with membership increasing by 50% since its launch. Source
SuperMoney reviews the new US consumer lending platform founded by Renaud Laplanche; firm is an online lender focused on personal loans, also offering consumer credit monitoring and education for its customers with benefits for high quality borrowers; SuperMoney outlines the platform's underwriting standards, application process, and pros and cons versus competitors. Source
Infinity Eclipse provides a new loan management solution for lenders; it features a user friendly interface for both lenders and customer service representatives; it streamlines data for performance reporting, customer service and accounting; the platform is highly secure and customizable; it's also built for a range of technical integrations and includes digital technology for documentation. Source
Brothers Patrick and John Collison have revolutionized how payments are transacted on the internet through their startup Stripe; source provides details on their backgrounds and the development of the business; reports on how the company has grown to provide services for more than 100,000 businesses and their new partnership with Amazon. Source
Podcast talks with former SEC Enforcement Division attorney Nick Morgan; Nick Morgan says the SEC is reviewing all types of cases and using the Howey Test to determine whether the deals are considered an offering of securities; explains that the Howey Test considers whether the expectation of profit relies on efforts of investors and also says that the investigations center around whether the investors are passively investing or actively involved in creating value; Morgan also noted that the SEC's resources are limited given the vast number of ICOs being offered and reports that the investigations will likely focus first on any fraudulent activity with potential investigation efforts also on exchanges that encompass the inclusion of many ICOs. Source
Trust Stamp, who focuses their business on identity authentication that leverages artificial intelligence and blockchain technologies, just raised a new round of funding from Second Century Ventures; the amount of the funding has yet to be disclosed; Trust Stamp uses artificial intelligence software to comb through public records and social media data to provide ID verification to real estate professionals who meet new clients; the new funding will help them to continue building out their technology and integrate blockchain into their processes. Source
Income& has developed a new real estate investment product, the Prime-Rated Individual Mortgage-Backed Obligation (PRIMO) and is one of LendIt's finalists for the 2017 Emerging Real Estate Platform award; the product allows investors to invest in secured mortgage loans and targets yields of 6% or more; it is open for investment to accredited investors and investment advisers and the firm also has plans to offer the product to all investors. Source
Innovate Finance has released a report on fintech investment showing global investment in fintech increasing but decreasing in the UK; global fintech investment increased by 10.9% in 2016 to $17.4 billion; in the UK, fintech investment decreased by 33.7% to $783 million; fintech investment in China and the US accounted for $13.9 billion of the total $17.4 billion. Source