Fintech
Why SellersFunding is Now SellersFi
March 28, 2023
The financial platform dedicated to servicing e-commerce companies is now going by the name, SellersFi. Diversifying the brand beyond their funding capabilities, the rebranding is to bridge the gap between working capital and payment solutions.
Onward with the name change, starting in April they’ll be offering insurance and improving the capabilities of their digital wallet. And in Q3 this year, they’ll be launching FDIC insured business checking accounts for their clients, as well as credit cards. SellersFi will also continue to fund from as low as $25,000 to $10 million, to be the go-to platform for all their customers’ financial needs.
“…working capital and risk management is in our DNA, it’s the core of our business, and we will always be like that,” said Ricardo Pero, CEO at SellersFi. “But that doesn’t mean that we will turn our backs to opportunities to serve our clients in a more efficient way than what they have these days in other segments of the market.”
Clients already can channel their marketplace payouts digitally, so the idea is to offer an under-one-roof, all-in-one solution. They have also added on a product called Invoice Flex where their clients can choose to pay between 3 to 12 installments on their invoice.
“Every time our customers demand solutions and improvements in our platform, we hear them,” said Pero.
“We’re Hiring” But are they really?
March 26, 2023
We’ve all encountered folks in the industry that will swear up and down that business has never been better even when everything is falling apart behind the scenes, but apparently businesses in general may go to great lengths to keep up such appearances. One way they do this is by advertising job roles that they won’t actually fill. According to Joe Mercurio, project manager at Clarify Capital, 43% of employers who post ghost jobs aren’t actively trying to fill positions but rather it’s “because they want to keep employees motivated or they want to give off the impression that the company is growing.”
Clarify Capital gleaned this data from a survey it conducted which was then cited in the Wall Street Journal last week. The survey also found that employers have job listings up just to see who might apply, to have an active pool of candidates in case of turnover, or because they simply forget to delete listings for jobs that are no longer available.
According to the WSJ story, titled “Job Listings Abound, but Many Are Fake,” the number of ghost jobs distort hiring demand and applicants across different fields have reportedly found it increasingly difficult to apply for jobs where the employer is actually looking to fill it. The takeaway, perhaps, is that if one is pursuing a new opportunity right now, the presence of job listings may not be enough on its own to indicate which way a company is going. You’ll have to dig a little deeper so that you’re not disappointed.
In The Funding Biz? Here’s What to Know
March 9, 2023Are you in the biz of funding small biz? Listen to these execs tell you how to make it work!
Effective Broker Training
Successful Digital Marketing With Zack Fiddle
Measuring the Impact of Technology on Your Funding Business With Adam Schwartz
Building a Successful Funding Brokerage With Frankie DiAntonio
Filling The Funding Gap for Canadian Borrowers
March 5, 2023
“Generally, capital availability is usually stronger in the U.S., but I would say Canadian businesses are definitely less serviced when it comes to options to be able to access capital,” said Cato Pastoll, Founder and CEO at Loop. “There’s just kind of less services or less products out there for companies so that definitely means that there’s going to be more demand for loan related products.”
One of the lingering challenges in Canada is that the big banks tend to hoard the data that would be valuable to fintechs to service more borrowers, hence the recurring call for open banking.
“If you’re a fintech and you don’t have access to that information, you have to figure out a way to access it from the banks that do hold it,” said Tal Schwartz, Senior Product Manager at Nomis Solutions and Writer at Canadian Fintech. What’s happened as a result is that a whole cottage industry has formed to figure out ways to relay data without APIs.
Cato Pastoll’s company, Loop, is among those that have come up with clever solutions to service Canadian customers. For example, Loop can help Canadian-based companies obtain loans in U.S. dollars to help them grow while also offering other services like expense management tools and cross-border payments.
“A lot of businesses have a hard time getting financing from the bank,” Pastoll Said, “so there’s definitely a few players that do provide different products to help companies be able to access growth capital, working capital, and many of them have been around as long as we have for the last five to ten years or so.”
“So, things that can probably improve in Canada are all related to competition, law, and kind of creating a more equal playing ground between banks and fintechs,” said Schwartz. Although those initiatives seem to be trending in the right direction, it’s been a very a slow march forward.
A Quick Analysis of Bank Data? Kuboon!
February 8, 2023
Accessing a small business borrower’s bank statement data is nothing new but Kuboon, not to be confused with kaboom, gives the whole experience an upgrade. A lender can embed Kuboon’s technology into their existing CRM with a simple line of code and be up and running in no time.
According to Kuboon VP of Sales Brysen Partridge, the technology doesn’t necessarily compete with universal tools like Plaid and Finicity because Kuboon actually uses them too.
“So we compare differently because our engines are far more advanced,” said Partridge, “[The big aggregators] give you a small out of the box engine of just giving the transactions and then you have to come up with your dev team to try and filter out and fix and categorize all those transactions and make them into something useful. We do all that for you…”
Partridge said that’s far from everything. “It’s not just bank details,” he said. “We have payroll and ID data. We have other sources that are coming in soon that will provide a ‘complete integrated intelligence.'”
Recognizing that not everyone will embed it, Partridge said that Kuboon can also be used as its own standalone CRM, a feature they call Kuboon Lobby and that many clients choose to use it this way.
Lendica Integrates with Shopify and Salesforce
February 7, 2023
Shopify and Salesforce users will now be able to access loan products through Lendica. Now, how does it work? Lendica gives their software to Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) and once installed, their customers will have access to Lendica’s funding products (PayLater, FundNow, and DrawDown).
PayLater is similar to how BNPL works, allowing vendors to delay their payments to a weekly basis. FundNow resembles an accounts receivable product where merchants can get paid up to 90 days ahead of the seller terms offered from their wholesale account. DrawDown is working capital that allows businesses to borrow against their future cash flow. These three products can be integrated into Shopify and Salesforce with an embedded funding or pay later button.
“We’re giving this tool to these ISVs so that their customers can instantly access our product and then learn about our other funding tools,” said Jared Shulman, CEO at Lendica.
“The most important piece, and this is kind of the excitement of Salesforce and Shopify is that what Lendica was doing is building this missing infrastructure in the small business lending space…,” said Shulman. “And what that is, is this standardized lending language, we call it the Lendica token that allows any financial institution to get a complete picture of a business, and then a point of reference on what that picture means.”
Lendica has experienced strong adoption of its products. According to Shulman, its PayLater product alone has garnered more than 10% growth month over month.
Marcus Ceases Its Lending Business, Admits They Tried to Do Too Much Too Quickly
January 23, 2023
It’s the end of an era. Marcus, an online consumer lending venture launched in 2016 by Goldman Sachs, is winding down its lending business. Rumors of the shift circulated around the media last month but last week Goldman Sachs made it official.
“We started a process to cease offering new loans on the Marcus platform,” said Goldman CEO David Solomon. “We will likely allow the book to roll down naturally, although we are considering other alternatives.”
Solomon attributed the move to the firm reorganizing itself but elaborated further when pressed.
“…we tried to do too much too quickly,” Solomon said. “And of course, in the environment that we are in, it’s hard to go back when we started in that strategy 6 years ago. We obviously built the deposit business, the loan business, and we talked about a much broader platform and I think we came to the conclusion that there were some changes.”
Solomon added that in trying to do too much, it was affecting their execution and he conceded that they didn’t have “all the talent we had needed to execute the way we wanted.”
Left unsaid about Goldman’s original motivations was a desire to compete with LendingClub, who had blazed a massive trail with peer-to-peer lending and showed the world a market of potential untapped opportunity. The two firms went head-to-head against each other for consumers and LendingClub eventually ditched peers as a source of financing and later became a bank itself. The final destination for both companies brings closure to the twenty-teens where growth of an online lending business at any cost was all the rage.
Coincidentally, The Federal Reserve is now investigating Goldman Sachs’ use of appropriate safeguards in its Marcus lending division, according to the WSJ.
The Marcus online savings account product is reportedly remaining active.
What’s To Come in 2023? The Industry Shares Their Predictions
January 11, 2023
It’s halfway into the first month of the new year and the expectations for 2023 are buzzing. Fintech and alternative finance executives have different views on what’s to come. Here’s what they had to say:
Nick Chandi (CEO & CO-Founder at Forward AI): “Adopting real-time payments (RTPs) will be critical in 2023 as SMBs continue to grow. RTP transactions are set to grow 300% globally over the next five years, potentially becoming the new standard for banks, FinTech’s, and businesses to move money. The implementation of real-time payments allows SMBs to manage their cash flow better, settle transactions in real-time, hold cash for longer, and make due payments instantly.”
Bruno Raschio (President at East Capital): “Predictions include negative growth in the equities markets as earnings estimates lower, the S&P to remain below 4,000 by the end of the year, as well as stagnant growth in real estate prices. Even a 10-20% in price reductions in real estate prices as interest rates continue to rise, closing in on 30-year highs.”
Gregg Templeton (Founder at TRAM Funding): “I predict that embedded finance will really take root this year. Both B2B and B2C will be looking for ways to embed banking and financial services directly into their user experience.”
Tyson Rose (Head of Partnerships at BlockApps): “My top three predictions for the financial world as we enter 2023 are as follows. Lenders will outsource more of their business processes and adopt new technologies to drive down costs wherever possible. Smaller lenders will enter the direct ABL and factoring market. Banks and FIs will focus on building fintech solutions to take greater market share in the transportation and supply chain financing industries.”
Sharmylla Siew (Senior Underwriter at Lending Valley): “We predict a number of funders to tighten up their guidelines during the recession and the continuous spread of the regulations state by state with less funding being outputted by hybrid funders.”
Alicia Josshua (ERC Specialist & Field Underwriter at Symmetry Financial Group): “Small businesses are leaning more towards alternative financing because of the flexibility. This financing niche allows for quick turnarounds in approvals and fundings within a week. Big banks have scaled back on lending such as lines of credit [and there’s a] longer approval process such as 4-8 weeks. The alternative financing space is not being affected and makes a great outlook for businesses.”
Andy Parker (CEO at The LCF Group): “2023 will be a challenging year for both small businesses and funders. Increasing borrowing costs, increased compliance and regulatory costs, and more frequent defaults for funders will lead to more expensive funding and tougher qualifications for small business borrowers.”
