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How to Lend Money to Strangers — Business
How to Lend Money to Strangers

A podcast about lending innovation and lending leadership in all the markets in which it takes place, however diverse those markets may be. In fact, it’s a case of ‘the more diverse the better,’ with guests from New York to New Zealand discussing everything from crypto-backed mortgages to crowd-funded loans for refugees to gamified loan journeys to AI-powered credit scores.

I am the host, Brendan le Grange, and I have spent the last twenty years working in – or alongside – lenders in Africa, Asia, and Europe and I’m using that experience to find and learn from industry insiders in a series of weekly interviews. Sometimes, those interviews discuss the inspiration behind a new start-up, sometimes they look back at a career spent at the lending coal face, and sometimes they explore where the latest technologies might take us. In the end, if it shapes a lending decision, we’ll talk about how. You can join us every Thursday here, or wherever you prefer to find your podcasts.

You can find more at www.HowToLendMoneytoStrangers.show

Or follow my other projects at https://confirmu.com/, https://www.joinhumoni.com/, https://chaos-out-of-order.com/

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Copyright: © Copyright 2021 All rights reserved.

Latest Episodes:

Holding up a mirror to the lending industry, with Elena Botella (Delinquent: Inside America's Debt Machine) Oct 13, 2022

Show notes

"Fairness in pricing often starts with the idea of competition - if there's healthy competition, that will bring the price down. But, in the United States, if you look from the 1990s to the 2020s, credit card profits have steadily risen, and real interest rates have steadily risen and at the same time, default rates have fallen and it's just less expensive, in some ways to run a credit card company than it used to be - so I think that's the first clue that the pricing isn't fair".

In this episode of HTLMTS, I speak to Elena Botella, a fellow CapitalOne alum who, when she realised how incentives in the modern could become misaligned in the modern lending model, decided to do something about it, something rather inspiring to a wandering soul like me - she took herself on a road trip around America to hear the human story of consumer debt.

"In the credit card industry, you see the transaction, you see what some this credit enables, but you don't always see the harm side of it... I heard from consumers who had followed a similar pattern, and came to feel that credit cards had done them more harm than good".

Delinquent: Inside the American Debt Machine launched this week (11 October 2022) and is now widely available in all bookstores, but the folks over at https://bookshop.org/books/delinquent-inside-america-s-debt-machine/9780520380356 probably appreciate your business more than the bigger names we might gravitate to first (I’m not pointing fingers, I have my own Amazon links down below 😅)

You can find more of Elena’s writing at http://elenabotella.com/about or on Twitter as @elenabotella. While Elena’s work at Omidyar Network starts here: https://omidyar.com/omidyar_team/elena-botella/

The research of mine that looked ta price sensitivity is getting old now, but is over here https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/increased-price-transparency-shake-up-hong-kong-loan-market-brendan/

You can learn more about myself, Brendan le Grange, on my LinkedIn page (feel free to connect), my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this very show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24

If you have any feedback or questions, if you would like to participate in the show, or if you'd like to find full written transcripts with timestamps head on over to HowtoLendMoneytoStrangers.Show

Oh, and since you like banking podcasts, head on over to https://blog.feedspot.com/banking_podcasts/ to find related content that you may find interesting.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A more inclusive credit score for lending and securitization, with Toni Hubbs (VantageScore) Oct 06, 2022

Show notes

Credit scores are near to my heart. I kinda work around them now, but still, I spent a wonderful decade rolling the things out and so I’m getting back to my roots. In today’s episode, Toni Hubbs talks to me about how the team at VantageScore is driving inclusion and transparency in credit scores at scale (a really, really big scale), and about how and why those scores are being used in securitization deals.

Head on over to https://vantagescore.com/ to find all their educational material

You can find The Score, VantageScore's own podcast on their website, https://vantagescore.com/lenders/tools-and-resources/the-score-podcast/ and wherever you're listening to this one.

You can learn more about myself, Brendan le Grange, on my LinkedIn page (feel free to connect), my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this very show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24

If you have any feedback or questions, if you would like to participate in the show, or if you'd like to find full written transcripts with timestamps head on over to HowtoLendMoneytoStrangers.Show

Regards,

Brendan

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

How to lend money to refugees, with Lev Plaves (Kiva) Sep 29, 2022

Show notes

This is a special interview for me. HTLMTS doesn't pull in huge volumes of listeners, but that's OK, that's not really what I'm after. I want the right listeners, not the most listeners, and so I get excited when a guest tells me they got a business lead after their interview, or when one guest asks to be set up with another for some new project, or when, like today, I get to look inside a company that I've long admired.

Kiva first came into my consciousness in 2006 as an early grad school project. I actually tried to back this up with some old PowerPoints, but although I found an old CD with 'MBA files' scribbled on it, it turns out we don't have a CD reader on any of the computers in this house, so you'll just have to take my word for it 🤣 Anyway, the point is they're a foundational fintech, and one with a social drive to boot.

Today I'm chatting to Lev Plaves about the ways in which Kiva has evolved since my school project, and in particular how he and his team are lending money to refugees. The Kiva Refugee Investment Fund successfully closed with $32.5 million, and they're multiplying that impact by following an open approach, sharing their lending results as they go, so others can take heart from the fact that loan officers now say that "refugees are now the first people they look to, because of what their performance has been and how strong they've been as clients".

Kiva is, of course, at https://www.kiva.org/ but then you'll want to jump straight to the refugee tab - I'm helping Ali put up solar panels and Alaa with her sewing business, for example.

Or find their blog at https://www.kiva.org/blog

You can reach out to Lev and the team by email via refugees@kiva.org

You can learn more about myself, Brendan le Grange, on my LinkedIn page (feel free to connect), my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this very show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24

If you have any feedback or questions, if you would like to participate in the show, or if you'd like to find full written transcripts with timestamps head on over to HowtoLendMoneytoStrangers.Show

Regards,

Brendan

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Crypto-backed mortgages, with Phil Blows (ByBrix) Sep 22, 2022

Show notes

In February, I spoke to Phil Blows about backing traditional loans with digital assets. The crypto markets had a rough time in the months that followed, so I wasn’t expecting much progress on that front, but I was wrong. Bull markets are a great time to build, after all.

So I have Phil back today, talking about ByBrix and their new crypto-backed mortgage offering.

And sure, to crypto outsiders like me, this might feel like a scary time to be building in this space, but as Phil reminds me, “a lot of these people didn't get into crypto to then move back into fiat, they go into crypto because they think they're going to stay there for the rest of their lives. So it's more that they're dabbling in the world of fiat, but living their lives in crypto.”

There’s a significant demographic out there who have built wealth in crypto, and would like to keep as much of their wealth there as possible, even as they look to finance a home.

You can learn more about ByBrix at their home page https://bybrix.io/ (or on their LinkedIn)

While you can find more on AQRU at https://aqru.io/ (plus Phil has been on before, on episode 29, talking about crypto and AQRU)

You can learn more about myself, Brendan le Grange, on my LinkedIn page (feel free to connect), my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this very show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24

If you have any feedback or questions, if you would like to participate in the show, or if you'd like to find full written transcripts with timestamps head on over to HowtoLendMoneytoStrangers.Show

Regards,

Brendan

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The service is the collateral, with Neel Juriasingani (Datacultr) Sep 15, 2022

Show notes

"It was, at that time, a very crazy idea", Neel Juriasingani tells me. "A lot of people still look at us as those crazy guys. But coming from that tech mindset, we were forced to think about how tech could be built to solve these challenges".

Over the last decade or so, lenders have invested a lot of time and money to turn the smartphone into an optimised account acquisition tool - you want to be where your customer is, after all. But the fact that their smartphones are where your customers are at, means we could be using them for far more than data transfer. And maybe we just needed someone from the Telco industry to open our eyes to that.

Neel and his team at Datacultr have optimised the smartphone as a contact tool, even when they're outside of network range, to create as many opportunities to engage with a customer as possible, and in a language that they understand. They're even able to turn phone service into virtual collateral if that's what's needed to secure a loan for the most underserved and underbanked populations.

More on Datacultr can be found at https://datacultr.com/ (or find their Fintech50 recognition at https://www.inclusivefintech50.com/2021-cohort)

If you'd like to learn more about their model, or if you'd like to maximise the risk-reduction potential of your customers' smartphones, Neel can be reached for discussions via neel@datacultr.com.

You can learn more about myself, Brendan le Grange, on my LinkedIn page (feel free to connect), my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this very show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24

If you have any feedback or questions, if you would like to participate in the show, or if you'd like to find full written transcripts with timestamps head on over to HowtoLendMoneytoStrangers.Show

Regards,

Brendan

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Explainable AI and a new style of credit bureau, with Evan Chrapko (Trust Science) Sep 08, 2022

Show notes

We eat volatility for breakfast, we make love to volatility!

Which is handy, because we’ve all heard it, most of us have even said it ourselves, the world is very volatile at the moment. So when Evan Chrapko of Trust Science told me how their models embrace volatility, I knew we were onto something interesting. Even more so, because I spent a decade working in the credit bureaus myself, and that’s the industry that Trust Science is disrupting right now with its volatility-eating models.

As mentioned in our chat, your first port of call for further information is https://www.trustscience.com/ (though they are also on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/trust-science/)

Or you can jump straight to the news articles about their work https://www.trustscience.com/articles-page (including the Mail and Globe article we spoke about)

Evan was also recently at LendIt USA, and you catch a video clip behind the scenes here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34PrP7Ak4aw

You can learn more about myself, Brendan le Grange, on my LinkedIn page (feel free to connect), my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this very show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24

If you have any feedback or questions, if you would like to participate in the show, or if you'd like to find full written transcripts with timestamps head on over to HowtoLendMoneytoStrangers.Show

Regards,

Brendan

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Lending in frontier segments, with Todd Kleperis (Payzel) Aug 25, 2022

Show notes

Not all bankers wear suits - some, like Todd Kleperis, are built for frontier markets. It has been a decade since Washington and Colorado legalised the use of cannabis, and 17 States have followed suit, but with federal legalisation not yet on the books, most banks in the United States remain wary of the £33 billion industry. This, in turn, leaves the fast-growing recession-resilient sector starved for credit.

Forged out of frustration with this status quo, Todd and his team built Payzel to fix this, and are offering banking and funding to cannabis businesses, both startup and established. More on Payzel can be found at https://payzel.com/ or on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/river-florida/

And it turns out, cannabis isn't the only industry considered too risky to touch, so Payzel have expanded into other frontier market spaces. The Sea Pods we spoke about have just been launched this week, so head over to https://oceanbuilders.com/ for some modern living design inspiration

You can learn more about myself, Brendan le Grange, on my LinkedIn page (feel free to connect), my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this very show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24

If you have any feedback or questions, if you would like to participate in the show, or if you'd like to find full written transcripts with timestamps head on over to HowtoLendMoneytoStrangers.Show

Regards,

Brendan

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The future of South African banking is open, with Nick Tuttelberg (DirectID) Aug 23, 2022

Show notes

Open Banking is a proven technology with proven use cases, and in the UK, perhaps its spiritual home, user numbers continue to rocket - there are now more than 6 million active Open Banking customers there.

However, some other markets are looking on and wondering what the fuss is about.

This was surprising to me. And it was surprising to today’s guest, Nick Tuttelberg of DirectID. After all, there’s not a business alive today that wouldn’t want better data, and Open Banking provides some unique ways to generate and leverage data. But it seems the concept is still misunderstood in some sectors, so Nick and I take a step back and look at how a market like South Africa could benefit from encouraging Open Banking.

As we mention in our chat, this is the second time I have interviewed someone from DirectID, so if you’d like to deeper dive into the company and its mission, you can listen to my chat with its founder, James Varga, in episode 36 of this show: https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-36

But you can learn more about DirectID on their (recently redesigned and now looking very lovely) homepage https://www.direct.id/ or via LinkedIn

LinkedIn is also a good place to find Nick if you’d like to start your own Open Banking journey, he’s here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicholas-tuttelberg-87bb0628/

You can learn more about myself, Brendan le Grange, on my LinkedIn page (feel free to connect), my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this very show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24

If you have any feedback or questions, if you would like to participate in the show, or if you'd like to find full written transcripts with timestamps head on over to HowtoLendMoneytoStrangers.Show

Regards,

Brendan

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

BNPL in the Middle East, with Ziyaad Ahmed (Spotii) Aug 18, 2022

Show notes

BNPL is usually spoken about in terms of it being a more convenient payment tool for people in option-rich credit markets, but a revenue model that doesn’t require interest resonates with Middle Eastern customers for even more reasons.

So in this episode I speak to Ziyaad Ahmed, co-founder and COO at Spotii, a Dubai-based BNPL now in the ZipPay stable.

You can learn more about Spotii at https://www.spotii.com/

Their social tag is @spotiime ala https://instagram.com/spotiime?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

You can learn more about myself, Brendan le Grange, on my LinkedIn page (feel free to connect), my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this very show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24

If you have any feedback, questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the HTLMTS.show page

Regards,

Brendan

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

AI driven credit scores, with Sabelo Sibanda (CreditAIs) Aug 16, 2022

Show notes

More than 200 million formal and informal micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises in emerging markets lack adequate financing to thrive and grow; and the majority cite the lack of collateral and credit history and business informality as barriers to that financing. Today's guest, Sabelo Sibanda, has built CreditAis to solve this by providing explainable deep learning models that use alternative data to accurately score small businesses that don't fit the incumbent scoring criteria.

You can learn more about CreditAIs on their website at https://www.creditais.com (or follow them on LinkedIn)

We also mentioned Tuse, an earlier venture by the same pair. If that sounds interesting, learn more at https://tuseapp.com/

You can learn more about myself, Brendan le Grange, on my LinkedIn page (feel free to connect), my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this very show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24

If you have any feedback or questions, if you would like to participate in the show, or if you'd like to find full written transcripts with timestamps head on over to HowtoLendMoneytoStrangers.Show

Regards,

Brendan

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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