OAKLAND, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--LendUp, the company whose goal is to make financial health a reality for all, announced today it has issued over $2 billion in consumer financing through its digital lending platform. Since 2012, LendUp has provided more than 6.5 million loans, with an average loan value of approximately $300. The company continues its commitment to providing more people with greater access to consumer credit and financial services.
“We’re very proud of this significant lending accomplishment, the progress we’ve made in driving disciplined, profitable and sustainable growth, and our role as a standard bearer for responsible and inclusive lending and banking,” said Anu Shultes, CEO of LendUp.
Named by CB Insights as one of the startups disrupting the retail banking value chain, LendUp helped to pioneer embedded financial education as a model to support the more than half of Americans who are underserved by traditional credit and banking markets. The company combines its education programs with access to microfinance solutions such as short-term installment loans—which can help end the need for these consumers to take on more costly credit solutions, including traditional payday loans, title loans, and overdraft protection.
“Through our lending, education and savings programs, we’ve helped customers raise their credit profiles by hundreds of thousands of points cumulatively and saved them hundreds of millions of dollars in interest and fees from much higher cost products. While there’s much more for us to accomplish, this milestone is a real testament to the impact that financial service providers like LendUp can and should have on the market,” added Shultes.
In January 2019, the company announced the spinoff of its credit card business into a new entity, Mission Lane, allowing LendUp to focus on its core lending, experiential education and cost-savings programs that have helped to put more people on a path to financial health. LendUp customers have taken more than two million courses through the company’s gamified financial education platform that teaches them better ways to manage their money, establish a credit profile, and develop stronger financial behaviors—like saving for an emergency fund.
Anu Shultes Marks One-Year Anniversary as CEO
Shultes, one of the few female CEOs leading a major fintech lender, also marks her first year at the helm of LendUp, driven by her decades-long commitment to ensuring financial access and education for all. Her career spans a broad spectrum of roles across leading financial and technology brands such as Blackhawk Network, National City Bank, Providian, and AccountNow, among others.
“With Anu’s one-year anniversary, we’ve seen her push fearlessly to deliver on LendUp’s mission to create more opportunity for middle-income Americans. Anu’s experience building and managing multi-million-dollar credit portfolios, as well as her unique perspective as an immigrant and a woman, is helping to ensure a more inclusive and welcoming financial system that is desperately needed to grow the middle class,” added Don Butler, Managing Director, Thomvest Ventures, a LendUp investor.
Looking to 2020, LendUp is evaluating new inclusive finance programs that could disrupt the traditional markets for overdraft protection and insufficient funds fees, for example, and also considering the potential consumer benefits and trade-offs of subscription-finance models.
Women also make up a significant customer population for LendUp and will be a continued focus area this year. Across the industry, according to the FDIC data, female-headed households are more likely to be underbanked; they typically have fewer savings for unplanned expenses or emergencies and are far less likely to have access to credit than their male counterparts. Fundamentally, LendUp exists to innovate consumer financial products and better help these and other traditionally underserved consumer populations.
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About LendUp
LendUp is on a mission to help anyone get on a path to better financial health. The company is redefining financial services for Americans historically shut out of, or mistreated by, mainstream lending and banking services. Through its financial technology platform and alternative credit scoring, LendUp offers credit, financial education, and cost-savings solutions for the more than 130 million Americans who are rebuilding their credit or just starting out. Named one of the World's Most Innovative Companies in 2018 by Fast Company, LendUp is backed by leading growth capital and strategic investors such as Google Ventures, PayPal Ventures, Thomvest Ventures, QED Investors and Kapor Capital.
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