New Zealand small business lending specialist, Prospa, announced it has received access to the New Zealand Government’s Business Finance Guarantee Scheme (“BFGS”).
The BFGS can help small businesses access credit for cashflow, capital assets and projects related to, responding to, or recovering from the impacts of COVID-19. Prospa has received an allocation under the Scheme, which can be applied to all eligible new loans issued by Prospa before 30 June 2021.
A recent study commissioned by Prospa and conducted by YouGov, showed that 57 per cent of Kiwi small business owners believe it’s getting harder to access funding from banks and traditional lenders. The same research also showed that of those small business owners who have tried to access funding, more than half (55 per cent) have missed out on opportunities to grow their business because they couldn’t access funding when they needed it.
Prospa seeks to address these issues using its proprietary credit decision engine (CDE) to quickly and effectively assess small business credit risk. The CDE analyses over 450 unique data points with each application and leverages a database with credit data from over 100,000 application data sets. Small businesses can complete an application on Prospa’s platform in minutes, receive a credit decision within the same business day and, if successful, often have funds transferred within 24 hours.
Prospa’s originations in New Zealand have reached their highest monthly levels since inception, demonstrating increasing demand for capital and for viable alternatives to the banks, as small business confidence returns.
Adrienne Church, General Manager of Prospa NZ, said:
“Our inclusion in the BFGS will empower us to support even more SMEs as they look to hire new employees, upgrade equipment, roll out new products and services, and invest in their future. The Government’s decision to extend access to the Scheme to fintech lenders like Prospa reinforces the important and growing role we are playing in improving the flow of capital to small businesses across New Zealand.
“Our recent research shows that there is considerable pent-up demand, with many small businesses finding it difficult, cumbersome and slow to access funding through traditional banks. Prospa has always focused on small business and with our deep sector insights and data-driven technology platform, we are well positioned to deliver this crucial funding under the Scheme. We look forward to doing our part to support New Zealand’s continued economic recovery.”