In February China Rapid Finance launched a new mobile-based pre-approved borrower acquisition campaign for loans up to 500 RMB (US$80) and wrote 300,000 loans in the first month.
Zane Wang, PhD, Founder and CEO of China Rapid Finance, commented:
“Strong customer adoption of our online lending product has continued, recently putting us over the 800,000 loan mark. We believe that this represents the fastest growing and most efficient borrower acquisition program among all peer-to-peer lenders in China. This exponential growth demonstrates the popularity of our mobile loan product, which relies upon our superior credit decisioning capability and the market reach provided by our technology partners.”
China Rapid Finance was founded in 2001, the platform brings borrowing opportunities to a broad array of Chinese consumers, many of whom are accessing credit for the first time. The company focuses on “Big Data” to make its lending decisions and combines underwriting software and algorithms with correlated statistical analysis to accurately access the creditworthiness of its borrowers.
Wang continued:
“We are committed to changing the face of the Chinese lending industry, and are convinced that working with partners is an optimal strategy to achieve those changes rapidly. We are excited that we already have entered into cooperative arrangements with leading Internet partners.”
The Wall Street Journal reported in March that China Rapid Finance is exploring a US IPO. This would come after the Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba successfully tapped the US market last year by raising $25 billion. And it would also follow the successful floats of Lending Club and OnDeck.
Mobile lending is incredibly popular in China and is well suited to the offerings of peer-to-peer platforms. However, it is not something that is often talked about in the UK, perhaps this is a direction that we will see other alternative finance platforms moving in.
A staggering 50% of Lufax’s transactions are mobile and by the end of next year that figure could well be 70%. According to Lufax, the mobile market also has a pronounced impact upon referrals. Mobile makes it extremely easy for a satisfied customer to recommend a service to a friend after having accessed that service via mobile.
