Cerebro Capital’s Trick? Automating Compliance in a Loan Marketplace

Cerebro Capital CEO Matthew Bjonerud spoke to deBanked last week at Money 2020 in Las Vegas. He was standing at his booth in the “Startup” section of the conference’s Expo Hall.

Bjonerud and his team have created a marketplace for middle market loans, from $1 million to $100 million. And Bjonerud said that borrowers can anonymously search for lenders to determine which ones are the right fit for them.

 “We can show borrowers the lenders that can do the deals they want without telling the lenders that the borrowers are even looking, Bjonerud said. “It’s a great benefit [for borrowers] to using our platform.”

In addition to being a marketplace for middle market loans, the Baltimore, Maryland-based startup also simplifies the compliance process for lenders.

“Once loans are closed…we will automate the compliance,” Bjonerud said. “We’re the only ones who allow that to happen in the marketplace – where we will actually create the compliance certificates for the lenders based on automatically [using] financial statements and other elements.”

This compliance service is billed to the lender as a subscription fee. Otherwise, when a loan deal is closed via Cerebro Capital’s marketplace, it is the borrower, not the lender, that pays Cerebro Capital.

“We’re providing the borrower with better terms than they would otherwise get in the market,” Bjonerud said.

Todd Stone was a reporter for deBanked.