Inc. 500 Archives - Lend Academy

YieldStreet and LendingPoint Lead Fintechs on the Inc. 5000 List

The annual list of the fastest growing companies in the US features several fintech companies this year

August 14, 2019 By Peter Renton 1 Comment

Every year Inc. Magazine releases a list of the 5,000 fastest growing companies in the country. They call it the Inc. 5000 and it is a celebration of the entrepreneurial spirit. You have to be a fast growing company to make the list.

The 2019 list was announced this morning, but before we get to the successful companies on the list, here is a look at the criteria Inc. set for the entrants:

Have generated revenue by March 31, 2015
Have generated at least $100,000 in revenue in 2015
Have generated at least $2 million in revenue in 2018
Be privately held, for profit and based in the U.S.
Be independent (not a subsidiary or division of another company).

There were 239 companies that made the list in the financial services industry. Leading the pack was YieldStreet, who came in at #14 overall, closely followed by LendingPoint who was at #17.

In a statement on the YieldStreet website, CEO Milind Mehere said:

We’re proud to be named by Inc. as the 14th fastest growing private company in the United States, capturing the #1 spot in both the New York and Financial Services categories. We owe so much of our success to our incredible community of dedicated Investors.

LendingPoint CEO and Co-founder, Tom Burnside, had this to say about their achievement (more here):

Our platform saw more originations in 2018 than in 2015, 2016 and 2017 combined and at the same time our credit performance improved allowing us to facilitate more financing for consumers online and at the point of sale. We are incredibly grateful to our customers and proud of the LendingPoint team.

If you filter the list for financial services companies there are dozens of fintech companies that most of you would recognize. Here is the top 10 in the category that shows their growth percentage as well as their 2018 revenue.

Update: After I published it was pointed out that FundThatFlip also ranked highly on the Inc. 5000 (at #42) but were classified in real estate, not financial services. Honorable mention to them as well.

Many Fintech Names on the Inc. 5000 List of Fastest Growing Companies

Fintech has strong representation on the 2018 list of the fastest growing private companies in America

August 16, 2018 By Peter Renton Leave a Comment

Every year Inc. magazine publishes a list of the 5,000 fastest growing private companies in America called the Inc. 5000. These are the small companies that have grown the fastest between 2014 and 2017. Collectively, the companies on this year’s list amassed $206.2 billion in revenue in 2017, up 158 percent from $79.8 billion in 2014.

Of the 5,000 companies on this year’s list exactly 233 are in the financial services category. Below is a screenshot of the top 10 companies in this category. Leading the list is Fundrise, the real estate platform for individual investors, a name that would be familiar to Lend Academy readers (I interviewed CEO Ben Miller on the podcast last year). Another well known name is Fundera, the small business lending marketplace, who were the third fastest growing company in our category. I encourage you to explore the complete list here where you can search for specific companies or filter by industry, state and many other criteria.

Below is a graphic showing the top 10 companies in the financial services category. It is interesting to me that four of the top five companies on this list are based in New York City while San Francisco only has one company in the top 10.

LendIt Fintech Makes the List at #683

We are proud to be included on this year’s list in our first year of eligibility. LendIt Fintech made the list at #683 with a 736% growth rate from 2014 to 2017. Our conference grew from around 1,000 attendees in 2014 to 5,000 in 2017 but in that time we also added Europe and China events to our schedule. We expect to continue to grow and to be on this list again next year.

Online Lenders Featured in the Inc. 5000

Several companies from the online lending space made the Inc. 5000

August 23, 2017 By Ryan Lichtenwald 1 Comment

Every year Inc. pulls together a list of the top 5000 fastest growing private companies in the United States. This year there were around 250 companies that made it in the financial services category and there are several familiar names on the list. Inc. shares basic information on each company while also sharing 2016 revenue numbers, a metric that is often not publicly available. We congratulate all of the companies on making the list this year.

Below we’ve highlighted some of the big names:

Avant – #47

Avant is an unsecured consumer online lender that focuses on the near prime space. Over three years they’ve experienced 6,333% growth. The company did $437.9 million in revenue in 2016 and has 468 employees.

OppLoans – #219

OppLoans brands itself as an alternative to payday loans. The company has over 101 employees and did nearly $28 million in revenue last year. Growth over three years totals 1,970%.

Kabbage – #449

Kabbage is one of the leaders in small business lending. Last year the company brought in $171.8 million in revenue. Recently they raised $250 million from Softbank bringing their total equity raised to over $500 million.

loanDepot #1418

loanDepot has been somewhat of a quiet achiever but CEO Anthony Hsieh and his team have quickly built one of the largest non-bank lenders in the country. They brought in over a billion dollars in revenue last year and have over 5,000 employees, dwarfing every other company on this list. Earlier this year they crossed $100 billion in originations. Anthony Hsieh has a fascinating story and was on the Lend Academy podcast in 2016.

Other companies readers may recognize are Lighter Capital (634), Prime Meridian Capital Management (554), FastPay (1653), National Funding (2030), and ZestFinance (2202). You can view the full list which spans a wider range of financial services companies not covered here on the Inc. website.