Lending Express gets over regulatory hurdle to expand its offering
The fintech also exceeded its own growth expectations, surpassing $100 million in loans matched on its platform.
Fintech loans platform Lending Express has today announced it has exceeded $100 million in loans facilitated between small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) and online lenders. The platform, which matches businesses looking for finance using an innovative LendingScore to online lenders that can provide finance, launched in 2016 and is currently available in Australia and the US.
CEO and co-founder Eden Amirav said that the company's work ethic is designed around rapid and efficient action, so they did expect to grow faster than the average fintech.
"But in the end, we saw that we even exceeded our own growth estimations, with a 406% increase in the number of loans, 244% increase in loan volume and 196% increase in customers over the past 12 months," Amirav said.
Lending Express today has also announced it has obtained state permission to be able to operate in California. This follows their launch in 45 other US states.
"These two major milestones highlight the immense market demand for a fairer, more transparent lending process," Amirav said. "We've made it our mission to redefine loan creditability – a major factor in determining viability – and are delighted to see that our work has helped so many entrepreneurs realize their dreams. We'll now have the opportunity to help even more as we open our doors to the Golden State."
The LendingScore, available through Lending Express, is a unique financial profile which allows business owners to detect and fix shortcomings in their loan applications before they apply so they have a better chance of being approved.
Amirav said they did not have to market themselves differently in the US compared to Australia despite there being differences in the market.
"The obvious difference between the SMB lending market in the US and the Australian market is that it's a much larger and more competitive space. According to the 2018 US Small Business Administration, there are 30.2 million SMBs in the USA, while the 2016 report from the Australian Small Business and Family Enterprise Ombudsman showed a small business count of almost 2.1 million."
Amirav also said that Australia had a great fintech ecosystem that allowed Lending Express to carve out a space for itself.
"We found ourselves at a central point in the industry, in company with top players like Prospa and Capify, and being able to make a difference in improving small business lending. We're committed to responsible lending and the Australian market is also very regulated, so we encourage all of our lending partners to abide by the Business Lenders' Code of Lending Practice," he said.
"The US has a highly competitive fintech space, so we quickly learned that we needed to further improve our service, transparency, and product to add more value to our customers and partners in order to succeed."
In 2019, Amirav said Lending Express will continue to improve and expand its LendingScore product in order to provide our customers with even better funding options.
"Stay tuned for more on that," he said.
Find out more about Lending Express here.
Latest fintech news
Picture: Shutterstock
