Marketplace lending

Hong Kong and Singapore have long been economic crossroads. China and India are economies with vast populations. And Shenzhen is bursting with innovative creativity. All of these contribute to the Asian fintech market being far ahead in adoption and ecosystem creation.

The deal marks a milestone in SoFi’s evolution into a private bank for millennials, but it won’t solve the challenges of the alternative lender’s funding model.

Arkadi Kuhlmann, the founder and CEO of the neobank Zenbanx who pioneered branchless banking at ING Direct, explains why he stopped pursuing a bank charter and made a deal with Social Finance.

Usama Ashraf, the marketplace lender's new chief financial officer, will oversee finance activities and its capital markets function.

The acquisition should allow the San Francisco-based online lender SoFi to fulfill a long-standing goal: offering a deposit account to its young, upwardly mobile customers.

Eastern Bank developed its own online lending platform to compete with the likes of Kabbage and OnDeck. It might now be able to cash in by licensing to other banks.

If offering a national regulation option to fintech players is the carrot, compliance with commonsense borrower protections could be the stick in promoting responsible financial innovation.

The banking trade group confirmed that it has run a formal bidding process to find a partner.

Guest host Sam Maule chats with American Banker reporter Lalita Clozel and others about the OCC fintech charter, smart home devices, virtual assistants, the security and compliance issues posed by Alexa, and more.

BorrowersFirst said its new financing will come from Waterfall Asset Management, a New York firm that focuses on high-yield investments.

Wells Fargo faces an economic environment that may not be particularly suited for the way the bank is structured. Also: are you brave enough to make bitcoin a part of your retirement portfolio?

The startup, known for refinancing millennials' student loans, is now writing more than $100 million of home mortgages a month, and expects this to be its fastest-growing product. Here's why.

The U.K.-based firm has raised $373 million from investors since it was founded in 2010.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency's decision to offer a special-purpose charter for fintech firms may entice more players than expected.

Two influential Democratic senators' surprise objections to the OCC's fintech charter show that the initiative may be more politically fraught than the industry and agency expected.

In a letter Monday to Comptroller Thomas Curry, Sens. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, and Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., registered their strong opposition to the concept of the charter, which would allow certain types of fintech companies to avoid state licensing requirements by obtaining a limited-purpose national bank charter.

Both banks and fintech firms have a lot of questions about the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency's proposed new charter, including exactly how the agency will ensure nonbanks don't get a leg up on bank competitors.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency's decision to offer a special-purpose charter for fintech firms may entice more players than expected, including mortgage lenders and even some payday lending shops.

Even in a digital era, human connections still matter. That is one big disadvantage for fintech startups and increasingly for banks as customers stop making regular branch visits. So it is instructive to hear SoFi's thinking on how to overcome this challenge. It is trying some unorthodox tactics to better understand the people behind the data and to create meaningful connections with them.

From Dimon's campaign against earnings guidance to the bottom-line implications of rising rates, here are more of our favorite stories of the year. (See part I here.)