There was a surprising announcement from the presidential campaign of Donald Trump this morning. Sources inside the campaign revealed that Mr. Trump has successfully applied for and received a $35,000 personal loan from Prosper. He has committed those funds to his campaign.
I was astonished to hear this news given Mr. Trump’s large personal fortune so I contacted the campaign myself this morning. Here is Mr. Trump’s statement released just a short time ago:
It is very important to me to have a well-funded campaign. I decided to take out this loan on Prosper, not because I needed the money, I don’t, but it was a good business decision. I negotiated an incredible interest rate of 5.99% and decided to jump on this opportunity.
I immediately reached out to Aaron Vermut, the CEO of Prosper, for comment on such a high profile borrower and the huge boost in PR this must be for Prosper. But unfortunately he would neither confirm nor deny the existence of a loan from Mr. Trump citing Prosper’s privacy policy.
But Aaron did have a general comment about loaning money to wealthy individuals:
Billionaires have funding needs just like the rest of us. If they need a loan to put a down payment on an Aston Martin, repairs on their private jet, a new Rolex , a diamond encrusted toilet or even a presidential campaign we are here to help provide financing up to $35,000.
While the Trump campaign did not release the terms of his loan we can deduce from Mr. Trump’s statement that his loan is likely a 3-year AA-rated loan. The 5.99% APR is the lowest interest rate Prosper offers to first time borrowers which would be for those loan terms. Regardless, I expect this loan will be paid back early given the campaign has less than eight months to go.
I am very interested to see how this plays out in the media but as of this writing I have seen virtually no press coverage of this news, which is also surprising. Still, I expect we will see some articles written about this as the day goes on and this will indeed provide an expected PR boost for Prosper.
Regardless of your political views I am interested to hear what Lend Academy readers think of this interesting development. Please share your thoughts in the comments.
Peter Renton is the chairman and co-founder of LendIt Fintech, the world’s first and largest digital media and events company focused on fintech. Peter has been writing about fintech since 2010 and he is the author and creator of the Fintech One-on-One Podcast, the first and longest-running fintech interview series. Peter has been interviewed by the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, The New York Times, CNBC, CNN, Fortune, NPR, Fox Business News, the Financial Times, and dozens of other publications.