During the week I share the latest marketplace lending and fintech news on Twitter as it happens. Then every Saturday I take the most interesting news items and blog posts from the past week and share them here.
Weekly Industry Update: Fed Raises Rates, Affirm Joins Unicorn Club, Introducing Sharpe Ratios from PeerIQ – This week PeerIQ looks at Sharpe Ratios by analyzing a batch of LendingClub loans.
Amazon to strengthen fintech space with stake in Capital Float from Economic Times – Looks like Amazon is investing in a leading small business online lending platform in India.
Borrowing From Multiple Online Lenders Remains Prevalent from Caixin – In China online lending is going through a transition amid a government crackdown on bad actors.
China’s $189 Billion Giant of Finance Reveals a Huge Bet on Tech from Bloomberg – China’s third most valuable company, Ping An, the parent of Lufax, is going big on tech.
MarketInvoice touts double-digit returns for 2017 from AltFi – In the UK MarketInvoice is the leader in one important category, investor returns.
Upstart’s First SaaS Partner from LinkedIn – This is a cool partnership. BankMobile is now offering consumer loans “Powered by Upstart” in a new kind of bank/fintech partnership. Congrats to Dave Girouard and team.
Why Employers Need To Help Workers Deal With Income Volatility from Forbes – Great piece by Sasha Orloff on the responsibility of employers in the gig economy to help their workers cope with income volatility.
Fintech Charter Is Still in Play, New Comptroller Says from The Wall Street Journal – New head of the OCC, Joseph Otting, reaffirms the agency’s support of the fintech charter,
Why Amazon won’t buy a bank in 2018 from Tearsheet – I agree that Amazon won’t buy a bank in 2018 but they are still a very important company to watch for all fintech platforms.
Why do most U.S. banks shut the door on ‘open banking’? from American Banker – Great piece by Penny Crosman detailing why US banks are not open to open banking. Also explains why more fintech innovation is happening outside the US today.
Technology Drives Changes in CRE Lending Space from deBanked – Great piece on commercial real estate lending and how technology is creating new efficiencies.
High-tech lenders target the decades-old store credit card from Reuters – Point of sale financing is being disrupted by online lending platforms like Affirm and Klarna.
From the Lend Academy Forum
The Lend Academy forum is where investors go to discuss p2p lending. Below are some topics that were being discussed this week.
Worst Loan of the Day Thread, Grades A – C – Some investors have built their own credit scoring models and share the loans which score the worst.
Lending Club Exists for the Profits of Whom? – This thread turns to a discussion on real estate crowdfunding platforms.
Loan status migration / adjustment numbers – weird – LendingClub has a lower estimated loss rate for loans in default than those that are 31-120 days late.
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.