sale. Expect Affirm to grow in size and product offering over time. It’s a really great experience.

ffirm Affirm is reinventing installment loans and layaway for small to medium sized consumer purchases ranging from mattresses to Pelotons. They do not use traditional FICO credit scoring metrics, rather build their own credit risk profile of the purchaser, and there are $0 fees to the customer. Affirm charges the product vendor the fee because it increases purchase conversion at point of sale. Expect Affirm to grow in size and product offering over time. It’s a really great experience.
Tally  Tally (a Shasta company!) is helping Americans overcome credit card debt. Consumer credit debt is at all time highs surpassing over $1T in 2017, where 43% of people who have a balance have been carrying it for over 2 years. Tally is a mobile app enabling easy refinancing of credit card debt to enable the consumer to get debt free.

https://blog.goo.ne.jp/fastheroamalm/e/d7d0e67c7d6bb223a8ca32d1056e0bf8
https://blog.goo.ne.jp/fastheroamalm/e/5678a1011e2e7b8e50013dccd22f3563
https://blog.goo.ne.jp/fastheroamalm/e/5a32755fdff16d1f18eb143755c5c477
https://blog.goo.ne.jp/fastheroamalm/e/4311efce9affbc97d4eee439805634dc
https://blog.goo.ne.jp/fastheroamalm/e/8730ee2276c0d537532d6d0cded85270
https://blog.goo.ne.jp/fastheroamalm/e/3f3e99cfd0c71e43be50aecb2e8b1191
Petal Petal is a next generation credit card using personal bank data history to determine credit worthiness and credit limit — in other words, no FICO. They have an elegant consumer mobile app interface to help the user manage their bank accounts and spending, and there are no fees for access, with normal APR on credit balances held.
Brigit —Brigit saves Americans from $34B in overdraft fees every year. Through a simple mobile app which pulls applicant’s bank history data and builds a proprietary credit worthiness score, it provides access to a “bridge line” of up to $250 every month to ensure consumers can pay all their bills and not get hit with predatory overdraft fees. No APR, just a $10 fee per month.
Possible Finance Last year the Federal Reserve Board presented a study which showed that 40% of Americans could be financially devastated by an unexpected $400 expense. Possible Finance is keeping these users out of the predatory Pay Day Loan cycle. Through a simple mobile app interface, PF pulls user bank history to build a proprietary risk score and approve a loan to the user within 60 seconds of applying. While there is an APR based fee, users repay over time and because it is an “installment loan,” repayment history is reported back to credit bureaus to help increase the user’s FICO credit standing.
These are just a few companies of the many out there that are changing the way that financial services is practiced, making it better for the consumer and more inclusive as a whole.
These companies are signs of what is to come. Financially inclusive products are critical to the health of our global society collectively, and each individual personally. Capitalism is in the most precarious position it’s faced since its emergence two centuries ago. It needs to change, and access to capital is the tip of the spear. I’m excited by its evolution on the horizon, and to meet the entrepreneurs who are redefining it for the benefit of everyone around the world. If you are, or you know of, an entrepreneur redefining capitalism, financial services and financial inclusion I would love to meet you and talk about how we can do this together.
—
If you enjoyed this, consider subscribing to my weekly newsletter!
I invest in Emerging Platforms at Shasta Ventures, specifically technologies innovating on our financial world (the universal language of $$$) and innovations that bridge the digital & physical worlds including Applied Computer Vision, Perception, Robotics, AR/VR, Esports, and Blockchain.
Would love to hear your thoughts, feedback or insights. Get in touch at jacob at shastaventures dot com. Or find me on: