Home loan fintech raises $25m
A fintech start-up is celebrating a $25million raise as it continues on its pathway to becoming Australia’s “most innovative home loan provider”. Athena Home Loans, which is still in its pilot phase, has closed its most recent Series B raise led by Square Peg Capital. Industry super fund Hostplus and venture firm AirTree also joined the round, taking the group’s total capital raised to date to $45m. The Series B raise comes six months after the company announced a Series A fund raise led by Macquarie Bank and Square Peg Capital and three months after announcing a strategic partnership with Resimac Group. Powered by Australia’s first cloud native digital mortgage […]
Bendigo embraces fintech to offer instant home loans
In its bid to improve its services for potential mortgage clients, Bendigo Bank has partnered with fintech provider Tic:Toc to offer instant home loans starting early next year. The partnership enables Bendigo to utilize Tic:Toc’s platform in offering an automated assessment on home-loan applications. The bank was the first Australian lender to offer a digital home-loan application and assessment process under its own brand. Tic:Toc first launched the platform in July 2017, offering a streamlined digital fulfilment process. Tic:Toc founder and CEO Anthony Baum said the platform promises to cut expenses needed to process and deliver home-loan applications, resulting in cost efficiencies on the side of the lenders. “There’s actually […]
Prospa recognised in the Deloitte Technology Fast 50 Australia awards for Leadership
Prospa, Australia’s number one online small business lender, has ranked 5th for Leadership and 20th overall in the 2018 Deloitte Technology Fast 50 Australia Awards. The awards rank Australia’s fastest growing public or private technology companies based on their percentage revenue growth over the last three years (2016-18). To qualify, each company must have minimum cumulative revenues of $8m over the period. The Leadership category recognises those technology companies who have won a place in the Technology Fast 50 Australia list and whose strong track record of growth has generated cumulative operating revenues greater than $50 million. Beau Bertoli, joint CEO of Prospa said: “We’re delighted to be recognised as […]
How one fintech is changing the mortgage industry
Customers choosing home loans have traditionally either negotiated directly with banks or worked with a broker to secure the best loan that particular broker could find them. But with hundreds of lending products on the market and many brokers working with panels that limited them to a small subset of loans, consumers lacked the information to ensure they were getting the best rates and product features. Fintech Hashching has turned the process on its head by negotiating and de-branding a range of home loan products, which are then referred to brokers along with customer prospects. Because customers choose loans based on their attributes and aren’t told which organisation the loan […]
Lumi raises $31.5m to improve small business lending
Australian fintech company and alternative lender Lumi has announced it has raised $31.5 million in Series A funding as part of its plans to give small- and medium-sized enterprises easier access to finance. As a result of the funding, Lumi will become the first pre-revenue fintech business lender to offer a warehouse securitisation program in Australia. By combining its application programming interface (API) with traditional credit data and the applicant’s social impact, Lumi aims to streamline the loan application process for small business owners. Yanir Yakutiel, founder and CEO of Lumi, says the company is trying to solve the key issues of alternative lending for small businesses. “We saw a […]
Morrison government fund offers $2b boost for SME loans
The Morrison government will inject $2 billion into the small business loan market in an unprecedented effort to boost lending to cash-starved firms which have complained of a worsening credit squeeze.The creation of a taxpayer-backed securitisation fund to invest in small and medium enterprise (SME) credit will also potentially expand an asset class for institutional investors such as superannuation funds to invest in. Treasurer Josh Frydenberg and Small Business Minister Michaelia Cash will announce the small business funding policy on Wednesday, promoting the soon-to-be-established Australian Business Securitisation Fund as a way to overcome banks typically only lending to the self-employed when they pledge their personal home as collateral. The government […]
New breed of savvy Australians embrace digital and choice in pursuit of home ownership
The Lendi Home Loan Index Q3 2018 (LHLI) unveils key trends among Australians searching for a home loan online*. The LHLI suggests that more consumers are taking financial matters in their own hands by embracing a digital-first approach in lieu of the traditional bank or broker model. While the wider home loan industry is dominated by the big fours, the LHLI shows that Australians using Lendi are brand agnostic. In fact, 82.9 per cent of Australians don’t have a preference for settling their loan with a major lender. The LHLI data also signifies Australians’ positive intentions when it comes to their own debt management. An overwhelming 85.5 per cent […]
Ord Minnett readies online consumer lender MoneyMe for fund raising
Fast-growing consumer lending company MoneyMe knows plenty about writing cheques, and now it is asking potential investors to do the same. Street Talk understands MoneyMe will front institutional investors and family offices in coming days, seeking support for a pre-initial public offering funding round. The raising is expected to be worth as much as $15 million and structured as a convertible note issue. Stockbroker Ord Minnett has been lining up investor meetings in Sydney and Melbourne, fund manager sources said. If successful, it would be the first (quasi) equity raising by the personal lender. The company made headlines when it secured $100 million from global credit investor Fortress Investment Group […]
