In this episode we talk with Shivani Siroya, the CEO and founder of Tala. Tala is focused on delivering financial services to the underserved across the developing world, they are a true fintech success story.
When we really started covering financial inclusion and financial health here at LendIt five years ago it seemed that we had a very long way to go. Tens of millions of consumers were still left outside the financial system with no credit score and therefore had little to no access to credit. That has changed a great deal in the last five years. At the same time we have seen an explosion in Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) platforms.
Our next guest on the Fintech One-on-One podcast is Steve Smith, the CEO, and co-founder of Finicity. Finicity has been a real pioneer in the open banking space, or as Steve likes to call it an open financial data network, which is probably more accurate.
We have heard many times on this show and in the media that last year was a good one when it comes to savings rates and loan delinquencies. People were not spending as much and they received government stimulus to help with their savings and pay down their debt. So, when I received a survey last month that showed the exact opposite of this consensus, I wanted to learn more. So, while those generalizations are true, there is a segment of the population that has been hit brutally hard by the pandemic and in this episode we find out more about them.
Impact investing is having a moment. While it has been around in some form for several decades, today, many large and small investors are demanding that their money do more. They don’t just want to make an impact investment, they want to see exactly how they made an impact, in a measurable way.
For young adults just starting out in life or immigrants arriving to this country, there is no clear path to establishing a credit history. I know for myself, arriving in this country 29 years ago, I was rejected for a $500 credit limit card time and time again. For many people it is a catch-22, you can’t get credit because you have no credit history. This may be about to change.
Mike Cagney has built a reputation as one of the smartest people in all of fintech. His capacity to raise capital is unparalleled in our space but he is also a visionary who is tackling some of the biggest fintech challenges.
The low and middle income consumer has been struggling for decades. And while the pandemic has made things a lot worse there is a great deal of work being done to try to improve their situation. One of the key pieces is savings, as a country we simply do not save enough.
There are still three billion people around the world who are currently left out of the financial system. While many great organizations have done important work here there is so much more that needs to be done. And that was before the current crisis. The impact of the coronavirus will be felt more harshly in the developing world so the work being done in financial inclusion is more urgent than ever.