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
While fintech companies have focused on speeding up the lending process to small businesses, the IRS's continued use of fax machines continues to slow down the lending process when borrowing from traditional institutions; in an article from American Banker, the cumbersome process of getting a tax transcript from the IRS is outlined; when customers need capital on short notice they are often left with higher financing costs; Representative Patrick McHenry recently introduced the IRS Data Verification Modernization Act that aims to provide near-real-time communication of information which may level the playing field across lenders. Source
The marketplace lender has extended the maturity of its credit facility with Deutsche Bank to March 2019; the revised terms also add an additional $52 million to the credit facility; in comments regarding the revised terms, Howard Katzenberg, chief financial officer of OnDeck said, "The closing of this transaction reflects a continued ability to execute our financing strategy for 2017, which includes extending debt maturities and creating additional funding capacity for future loan growth." Source
Lendio reported record growth in loan originations for the fourth quarter and full year of 2016; firm is one of the leading online multi-lender services for small business loans in the US; in the fourth quarter it facilitated loan originations of $70 million and in 2016 loan originations from the platform were more than $240 million. 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
Short term small business lender Kabbage raised a $250 million Series F round from Japan's SoftBank, bringing their total equity funding to $500 million; according to TechCrunch, Kabbage CEO Rob Frohwein says the funding will be used to expand their US footprint, launch more analytical tools, expand into the Asian market and add new products; when talking with TechCrunch before the round was public, Rob explained the thought process behind going into new products like payments; Frohwein says: "Look at how PayPal and Square have both gone from being payments companies to small business lenders. There is a clear connection between how companies think about those two business areas, so it's not a giant leap of faith for us to consider this." Source
UK online lender Funding Circle has announced it will be slowing its property lending with plans to fully end the product by mid 2018; the firm is primarily focused on SME lending and says the refocused strategy will help it to increase SME lending and shift its resources for international expansion; property loans have previously only been available to UK borrowers and the product has accounted for approximately 5% of the company's revenue. Source
Small business loan facilitator, Lendio, has secured $20 million in a financing round led by investment from Comcast Ventures and Stereo Capital; Dave Zilberman of Comcast Ventures will be joining the firm's board of directors following the financing round; the firm seeks to partner with small business lenders in order to help them find the best loan provider for their needs; they currently partner with approximately 75 loan providers; in the third quarter they helped facilitate $63 million in loans for small businesses, an increase of 93% from the third quarter of 2015. Source
After several years of tightening credit requirements for business loans over the last couple of years more banks have been...
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