Show HN: Credy – Peer-to-Peer Lending Platform for India
credy.in
credy.in
The site looks janky, the fonts aren't rendering properly in chrome. (http://i.imgur.com/iRvmG2p.png)
Also, I was thinking of putting in some money but isn't 18% default rates kinda high? or is this some kind of test data (without any indication).
I'm on a HiDPI/Retina display, for what it's worth.
Inflation in India is quite high.
Rates can be much higher in informal lending space (I have myself heard cases of more than 70% annualised rate, charged over a smaller duration). Borrowers in that space can benefit by moving to a more efficient platform like Credy.
Actual default rate is of course lower than that.
Our customers are people who need small to medium personal loans -- they might need a loan for debt refinancing, a wedding, education or an emergency. We offers fast, paperless online loans to borrowers.
For lenders, Credy offers a professionally chosen, risk managed, trustworthy investment option, and great data and analytics tools. We guarantee 100% genuine and verified borrowers.
The founders have extensive background in finance and tech from Goldman Sachs, Societe Generale and Amazon.
Happy to answer questions you may have. Checkout our blog at http://blog.credy.in for interesting articles on finance in India.
- Harshit Vaishnav Co-Founder, Credy https://www.credy.in
Happy that you liked the idea :)
This looks very interesting. Was curious about a few things:
a) If I understand correctly, you are introducing p2p lending, on the lines of the Lending Club (the pioneer?) & I2I funding (Indian P2P lending company). Am I on the right track?
b) What is the typical customer profile you guys are targeting (and who have actually used your service?)
I ask because I'm curious about how you are planning to bridge the language / awareness gap if you are targeting non-English readers / speakers.
Disclosure: I am a partner in a start-up (3 months old) that is targeting blue-collar workers. Among the areas we are focusing on is financial literacy (clients being banks, etc.) Our experience has been that English is a significant barrier to adoption & communication. Therefore, pretty much everything we are developing is multi-lingual from the start.
(We are also developing solutions for the textile & apparel industries, safety & security services (Govt. and otherwise, and healthcare / pharma) )
Team Credy https://www.credy.in
Qs for you:
1. Shouldn't a new age lending platform not use old school mechanisms like CIBIL. I would guess that a new age lending platform build its own CIBIL.
2. Doesnt the requirement of Salary Slips preclude the very same people from accessing loans who do not otherwise have access to ? Also I am guessing that this will be like 1% of the population.
3. If you have the means to coinvest 50% and if you guarantee market beating outcomes, why don't go all the way to 100% ?
Salary is a regular source of income, which improves repayment capacity.
We are a platform, we don't want to be lending our capital as a primary business.
1. How does the platform ensure Borrower is paying on time and/or reminded for delayed-payments
2. Co-investment. This means you are sharing equal risk. But not sure how a platform could scale with the amount of money required. Are you planning to become a bank? I'd really like to know how your biz-model would work in this case. And how do you prevent a borrower-lender gang up to fraud you?
3. In case of non-payment, legal procedures could be costly and for small amounts it might be infeasible. How does Creedy help with the legal issues and legal costs?
1. Yes, we do the legal documentation so it is not a headache for you. Legal costs associated with non-payment are covered as part of this contract. 2. We have features like post dated checks and auto-debits from bank account to ensure borrowers pay on time, among other things. 3. We are not planning to become a bank, reason why banks have such a large spread is because they have huge operational expenses. We will always aim to be as lean as possible by automating processes.
Trust is indeed the biggest pain point in peer lending that we have focused hard to solve.
1. We guarantee 100% genuine and verified borrowers because of mandatory biometric authentication. This solves problem of identity theft and fake users.
2. We verify borrower's employer and their unique ID as well, so that there is a deterrent to improper behaviour on part of the borrower.
3. We co-invest with our lenders so that we have a skin in the game.
4. We also have auto-debit and post dated cheques to ensure money is returned on time.
How exactly do you plan to verify employer information?
Sorry if I may sound cynical but ive spent enough time in smaller indian cities that i can imagine ways on how people could try to take advantage of your platform.
We can understand the apprehension. However, lot of things are digitising fast, and it is getting more difficult to do financial misconduct without leaving a trail. We keep working hard in adding robust checks in the system, knowing that otherwise the problem you mention exists.
1. What exactly is Creedy's business model? You claim on your website that you charge zero fees, and digging around the FAQ reveals no other charges or figures, so I'm a bit curious as to how Creedy generates revenue.
2. What makes you standout from the throngs of P2P lenders in India? As I understand it, companies like Lendbox and Faircent pretty much offer the same service as you guys, plus already have an established user base, so why should I use your service?
P.S. Are you hiring interns?
2. Trust is a pain point that we solve by ensuring end-to-end linking with Aadhaar. We also provide investment recommendations in order to minimise portfolio risk.
Interns - we would love to have a chat, drop us a mail at careers@credy.in mentioning this conversation. Thanks!
What you call harassment is part of the Process for better due-dilegence. Most of the processes are created by bodies like RBI that are not-private. And they are bureaucratic and slow. But these same processes also prevent something like subprime crisis.
Unfortunately, when these regulating bodies work fast on policy making - people complain (remember daily demonetization policy changes??).
Getting loans from any bank (private or nationalized) definitely feels like harassment, but try to put yourself in their shoes.
Nationalized banks on the other hand - They have government to back them. So they can actually afford to be a bit wrong and govt will rescue them (from taxpayer's money)
Platforms like Creedy are great - but as an investor I would be worried about lending a larger amount
I just specify my risk appetite and you choose the borrower for me? or do you give me a list of options and I can choose who to lend to? Ideally I would prefer the first option.
Can I also limit my investments to a particular kind of borrowers, say who wants it for Educational purposes, is that possible?
Another question. I was looking at the investor dashboard and it shows a 'salary to EMI ratio', does that mean people who aren't employed with a regular salary are out? Like small business owners and such.
In my personal experience, I find that they are usually more interested in short-term borrowing since their cash inflows and outflows don't always balance, leading them to having to borrow quickly and for a short term.
Credy will levy a penal interest of 24% per annum on the due amount, in case of non-payment by due date. In worst case Credy will help lenders in getting all possible legal resources for recovery of dues.