Articles by Press Release
SBFA Announces Support for The Small Business Fairness Act
December 7, 2018The Small Business Finance Association (SBFA) today announced support for S.3717, The Small Business Fairness Act introduced by Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH) and Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL). The bill would provide the Federal Trade Commission more clarity to protect small business owners from being forced to sign a “confession of judgment” before obtaining financing. A “confession of judgment” requires a small business owner to waive certain rights in court before obtaining financing and, in some cases, allows the lender to seize the owner’s assets if there is a default.
“This is a bad practice that must be eliminated,” said Jeremy Brown, chairman of RapidAdvance and SBFA. “Unfortunately, certain small business financing providers are misusing “confessions of judgment.” We firmly support any legislation that will provide small businesses protection from the misuse of this practice. If a small business we fund runs into trouble, we believe they should be treated fairly and deserve our commitment to help resolve the issue in a manner that is professional and respectful.”
SBFA is a non-profit advocacy organization dedicated to ensuring Main Street small businesses have access to the capital they need to grow and strengthen the economy. SBFA’s mission is to educate policymakers and regulators about the technology-driven platforms emerging in the small business lending market and how our member companies bridge the small business capital gap using innovative financing solutions. The organization is supported by companies committed to promoting small business owners’ access to fair and responsible capital.
“Our core values are centered on providing fair and responsible financing for small businesses,” said Steve Denis, executive director of SBFA. “Small business owners are the backbone of the American economy and we should empower them with as many tools as possible to grow and create jobs. We look forward to working with Senator Brown and Rubio to eliminate the abuse of the “confession of judgment” and expand the role of responsible lenders nationally.”
In 2016, SBFA released best practices for the alternative finance industry to help better protect small businesses as they seek funding online. SBFA’s best practices are centered on four principles—transparency, responsibility, fairness, and security. As the industry’s leading trade association, the best practices have been agreed to by every member company and exist to give small business owners confidence in their financing decisions. These principles provide them a better understanding of what to expect from responsible alternative finance companies, which includes fully disclosing all terms and costs and ensuring the products SBFA companies offer are in the best interest of the small business customer.
The Small Business Finance Association (SBFA) is a not-for-profit 501(c)6 trade association representing organizations that provide alternative financing solutions to small businesses.
Popular Business-Lending Marketplace Dealstruck Restructures
December 3, 2018VALLEY STREAM, N.Y., Dec. 3, 2018 — Innovative online business-lending marketplace Dealstruck.com (which has been featured in CNBC, The New York Times, Forbes and many other publications) has reorganized. A private investment group of fintech experts acquired the company. “This acquisition represents a significant strategic opportunity for our client base,” said Dealstruck CEO Anthony Porrata.
Dealstruck is a leader in the alternative lending space. The company provides small and medium-sized business owners with seamless access to capital. Advances in technology make the process quick and efficient with minimal paperwork.
During the restructuring process, the company paused providing loans. “Recently, many people have asked, ‘What happened to Dealstruck?’ There were rumors that Dealstruck shut down but that was not true,” noted Porrata. “We’re happy to announce the Dealstruck news that a group of private investors has created a new ownership coalition that is leading a bold evolution for the company.” The new investment group combines a portfolio of existing small business capital providers with the highest technological advances in the field of online business loans.
Company leaders expect the change will help small businesses immensely. “Clients will see quicker approval turnarounds and a more streamlined process,” said Porrata. “This will also help clients who would not otherwise have equal access to growth opportunities.”
Vice President Chris Jones expects small business owners will be excited about the Dealstruck news. “This restructuring will allow us to approve more clients than ever before,” he smiled. “I’m looking forward to joining many new business ribbon-cutting ceremonies. Nothing gives us more pride than a grand opening.”
The reorganization allows Dealstruck to expand its mission while maintaining the personalized service that makes it so well known. The new management team has access to more capital and creative financing terms for Dealstruck clients.
About Dealstruck: As a leading online capital facilitator, Dealstruck connects small and medium-sized businesses with access to a variety of working capital options. These options help business owners find custom-tailored loans, so they can better manage their time and achieve their goals. For more information, visit dealstruck.com.
Contact:
Anthony Porrata – CEO
855-610-5626
info@dealstruck.com
Fora Financial & Expansion Capital Group Partner with Ocrolus to Automate Underwriting Legwork
October 8, 2018
New York, NY — Ocrolus, the emerging leader in analyzing loan documents, today announced integrations with Fora Financial and Expansion Capital Group, two of the fastest-growing online small business lenders. Enabling quicker and more precise loan decisions, Ocrolus has seen rapid adoption since its debut in the small business lending world with flagship customer Strategic Funding Source in May 2017. Following its Series A round highlighted by QED Investors, Ocrolus is quickly growing its customer base and team with laser-focus on the lending space.
Ocrolus employs crowdsourcing and artificial intelligence to drive efficiencies in the origination process, from document collection to calculating credit model inputs. The Company’s simple API ingests and analyzes bank statements and other loan files, returning actionable data and risk analytics, with 99+% accuracy.
Fora Financial, one of the most prominent New York City-based online lenders, has partnered with Ocrolus to automate bank statement reviews, resulting in a faster, more accurate end-to-end underwriting workflow. The benefits of automation have become increasingly important as Fora Financial accelerated growth after its June 2018 acquisition of US Business Funding. Leveraging Ocrolus to parallelize underwriting tasks, Fora Financial is poised to eclipse $400 million in annual originations over the next year.
“We are excited to automate an additional step in our underwriting process that has historically been very laborious, requiring additional staffing as we grew originations,” said Dan Smith, Co-founder and President of Fora Financial. “As a tech-enabled SMB lender, we rely on our technology to achieve scale while delivering a frictionless process for small businesses to access capital.”
Expansion Capital Group (ECG), recently honored on the 2018 Inc. 5000 as one of the fastest-growing private companies in America, has also partnered with Ocrolus to enhance its underwriting process. ECG sought a loan automation partner to facilitate ambitious growth objectives while improving risk management capabilities. With Ocrolus now handling its document analysis work, ECG, who has grown 627% over the past three years, looks forward to scaling its operation to new heights, thanks to its leaner, technology-enabled infrastructure.
Herk Christie, Head of Operations at ECG says, “Using Ocrolus solutions, we have been able to create a lean, smart and tech-enabled underwriting infrastructure that focuses on quality without sacrificing speed. The level of data Ocrolus provides will continue to feed the growth of our statistical models, further benefiting our clients and partners alike.”
Growing beyond online small business lending, into online personal lending and traditional banking, Ocrolus has added a couple of prominent lending executives to its team. Matt Burton, former CEO of Orchard Platform has joined Ocrolus as a Board Advisor. Kevin Bailey, former Senior Advisor at the US Department of Treasury, has joined Ocrolus as Head of Growth.
As CEO of Orchard Platform (acquired by Kabbage), Matt Burton became a cornerstone of the online lending community. Orchard’s Online Lending Meetup events regularly brought together industry thought leaders from all over the world, helping to shape the next generation of financial services. As an Advisor to Ocrolus, Mr. Burton is continuing his mission to grow online lending into an efficient, transparent, and global financial market.
A former White House and Treasury official, Kevin Bailey brings more than fifteen years of experience as a financial services and public policy professional. Prior to joining Ocrolus, Kevin was the Director of Business Development & Capital Markets at CommonBond, a leading marketplace student lender. Mr. Bailey is a graduate of Rice University and the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. At Ocrolus, Mr. Bailey is leading growth efforts as the Company expands beyond its core online small business lending market, into online personal lending and traditional banking.
Visit www.ocrolus.com for more information.
About Ocrolus
Ocrolus is a RegTech company that automates data verification and analysis for bank statements and other loan documents. The Company analyzes e-statements, scans, and cell phone images of documents from any financial institution with over 99% accuracy, and rigorous process documentation. By replacing tedious, imperfect human audits with sharp, AI-driven analyses, Ocrolus modernizes financial review processes in lending with unprecedented speed and accuracy.
Media Inquiries:
media@ocrolus.com
Greenbox Capital Introduces On Demand Loan Checkout Process
October 3, 2018Miami Gardens, Fl, 10-03-18
This latest on demand loan process function grants ISO partners the ability to increase term and funding amounts up to one month and 10%, respectively, without submitting a request. “The Box” was developed by CEO Jordan Fein and the innovative Greenbox IT team to give brokers additional flexibility.
The development mandate was to eliminate extraneous steps between the merchant and the broker which would further enhance those relationships and promote long lasting partnerships. “The Box” is now considered the most efficient, convenient user technology available.
“When the difference between winning and losing a deal is time, Greenbox Capital has provided a solution that allows our brokers to make more favorable terms, instantly! We have our pulse on the industry and the needs of our ISO partners. We regularly request feedback and implement upgrades to our technology to meet industry needs,” states Fein.
Greenbox Capital specializes in alternative funding options for small-and medium-sized business averaging at least $7,500 in revenue in each of the past 3 months. Greenbox Capital’s fast business cash advances and short-term small business loans make goals attainable.
The company’s small business financing programs include:
- Merchant Cash Advances (in available USA regions)
- Small Business Loans (in available USA and Canada regions)
- Invoice Factoring
- Business Lines of Credit
- Unsecured Financing
- Collateral-backed Funding
“We empower business owners to succeed by providing what they need most: access to working capital. We are committed to industry leadership in technology and will continue to develop processes that lead to a positive outcome for both merchant and broker,” adds Fein.
Greenbox Capital
855.442.3423
Info@greenbox.capital
RDM Capital Funding Secures $7.5 Million Credit Facility from Charleston Capital
September 12, 2018Clifton, NJ – RDM Capital Funding, LLC, a technology enabled specialty finance company, announced that it has entered into a new $7.5 Million credit facility with Drift Credit Opportunities Fund, LP, an affiliate of Charleston Capital Management, LLC. This is the first institutional credit facility for RDM Capital Funding, which was launched in 2015 and focuses on financing for small businesses throughout the United States of America.
“This facility allows us to expand our ability to serve more small businesses and help them with their working capital needs. We are pleased to partner with Charleston Capital and take this major step toward our continued growth,” said Reuven Mirlis, Chief Executive Officer of RDM.
“RDM represents an attractive opportunity for Charleston Capital as they have quickly established themselves as a disciplined underwriter with substantial operating controls,” said McLean Wilson, the Chief Executive Officer of Charleston Capital, “We expect them to become a significant presence in the space over the next few years and look forward to their continued success.”
About RDM Capital Funding:
Founded in 2015, RDM Capital Funding is a technology enabled specialty finance company, which provides working capital to small businesses. The company provides small businesses easy-to-access capital, through a quick, efficient and transparent process. RDM is headquartered in Clifton, NJ and employs 11 personnel.
About Charleston Capital:
Charleston Capital Management is an alternative asset manager that seeks to generate attractive, absolute returns by opportunistically and tactically investing in areas where conventional sources of capital are disproportionately unavailable. Charleston Capital was formed to expand the spectrum of opportunities for investors seeking risk adjusted returns that are less correlated to other markets. Specifically, the firm seeks to exploit inefficiencies that are borne from transactions requiring significant amounts of intellectual as well as financial capital. The firm is headquartered in Charleston, South Carolina and is part of inFactor, a FinTech firm focused on liquidity solutions for businesses. The Drift Credit Opportunities Fund is a credit strategies fund focused on structured loans to FinTech enabled Non-Bank Financial Services companies, which underwrite loans to small and medium sized businesses in the United States of America.
Contacts:
RDM: info@rdmcapitalfunding.com (877) 667-4647
Charleston Capital: media@charlestoncm.com (843) 310-3528
OnDeck Small Business Online Lending Tops $10 Billion
September 12, 2018OnDeck is the world’s largest non-bank online small business lending platform.
Federal Reserve says small businesses are turning to online lenders in record numbers
NEW YORK, N.Y., September 12, 2018 – – OnDeck® (NYSE: ONDK), today announced it has achieved a milestone in the Financial Technology (FinTech) industry, becoming the first non-bank online lender to surpass $10 billion in total loans originated to small businesses. OnDeck, with operations in the United States, Canada and Australia, is now the world’s largest non-bank online lender to small business by total loan volume.
The achievement by OnDeck, a pioneer of the FinTech lending industry, is the latest indication that small businesses increasingly prefer to seek financing online. According to the recent Small Business Credit Survey from the Federal Reserve, small business owners are turning to online lenders in record numbers. In 2017, 24 percent of small businesses seeking credit applied online, up from 21 percent the previous year. Not only did the total number of loan applications to online lenders increase in 2017, but satisfaction rates of small businesses soared almost 50 percent year-over-year.1
OnDeck provided its first small business loan online in 2007, taking just 11 years to pass $10 billion in total loan volume in a digital lending market it helped create. The majority of OnDeck’s lending occurred in the last few years as it gained scale, with the company originating $2.1 billion in loans in 2017 alone.
“If reaching $10 billion dollars in total loan volume online tells us anything, it’s that the days of old-fashioned lending to small businesses are numbered,” said Noah Breslow, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, OnDeck. “We created OnDeck because we believed the Internet could revolutionize and speed up the way underserved small businesses access capital. Today, we are helping to fill a credit gap across hundreds of industries by providing fast, secure and transparent loans that enable small businesses to grow, generate economic activity and create jobs. We look forward to providing billions more in financing and powering the small business lending migration to the online model via our OnDeck-as-a-Service platform.”
Small businesses are the economic backbone of America, accounting for more than 99% of all U.S. companies1 and employing over half of all private sector workers2. However, they still face a growing credit gap. According to the Federal Reserve survey, 54% of small businesses report credit shortfalls3 and lower-income communities are disproportionately impacted. Traditional large banks deny 44% of all small business loan applications3 and many are steadily exiting the small business credit market. Since 2008, small business lending from traditional sources has fallen over 20%4.
Identifying the developing credit gap over a decade ago, OnDeck transformed the means by which small businesses access capital, using proprietary technology and a small business credit scoring system, the OnDeck Score®, to more efficiently evaluate a business’ creditworthiness and make lending decisions in real time. OnDeck provides term loans and lines of credit to small businesses and can supply customers with funding in as little as one business day. The economic impact of this online lending activity is substantial. Immediate infusions of capital enable small businesses to purchase inventory, cover operational costs, or expand without delay, which can stimulate economic growth and help create jobs in their communities.
OnDeck and the Impact of Online Lending on the Economy
An Analysis Group report commissioned by OnDeck in 2015 analyzed the economic impact from the first $3 billion OnDeck lent to small businesses. The report estimates that those loans powered $11 billion in business activity and created 74,000 jobs nationwide. In 2018, OnDeck announced it had provided small businesses more than $10 billion in capital.
In May of 2018, a report on small business online lending in the United States revealed that OnDeck and four other small business lending platforms funded nearly $10 billion in online loans from 2015 to 2017, generating $37.7 billion in gross output and creating 358,911 jobs and $12.6 billion in wages in U.S. communities. The upsurge in online lending is filling a critical financing gap for small businesses across industries, according to NDP Analytics, a Washington, D.C.-based economic research firm. See the NDP Report here: http://www.ndpanalytics.com/online-lending/
OnDeck Company Timeline
Download here: https://www.ondeck.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/10-year-timeline-02.pdf
BFS Capital is a Sponsor of deBanked CONNECT – San Diego
September 4, 2018BFS Capital is a sponsor of deBanked CONNECT San Diego. The half-day event for funders, lenders, brokers and industry professionals is being held at the Andaz on October 4th!
Check out photos from deBanked’s past CONNECT event in Miami
Bitty Advance is a Sponsor of deBanked CONNECT – San Diego
September 4, 2018Bitty Advance is a sponsor of deBanked CONNECT San Diego. The half-day event for funders, lenders, brokers and industry professionals is being held at the Andaz on October 4th!
Check out photos from deBanked’s past CONNECT event in Miami
