Hi all,
I came across this news (which is 5 days old, so forgive me if you know about it), that a third of U.S. BNPL users are falling behind in payments, and more than 50% of Gen Z or millennial said they missed at least one payment.
So that’s not a negligible risk for the companies providing BNPL services. Also, the article stated that the explosion in these services has led to more scrutiny from the regulators, who don’t want people to take on more debt that they can handle. That’s also quite a risk.
I don’t know if these news are transferrable and worrying for UPST, but I would tend to say that since UPST takes so much care in selecting the borrower, it is a little bit more immune. The default rates seem to back this up.
Here is the link to the Reuters article: https://www.reuters.com/technology/buy-now-pay-later-surges-…
Sedi
(Long UPST, but not BNPL companies).
15 Likes
Hi Sedi
I’ve been hearing this get published in every regulatory territory around the world (ANZ, UK/Europe, N America and SE Asia). I actually don’t necessarily believe it represents a complete picture and is definitely being used as PR for lobbying by traditional finance/banking to force BNPL into regulatory oversight who absolutely see their credit based business models under threat so pay attention who is publishing this, who is paying for this and what the messaging is.
Leaving aside the point that Babyboomers and Gen X don’t exactly have a clean sheet on their personal, household or sovereign debt record and credit cards are a far greater debt trap than BNPL, (credit cards are predicated on increasing debt and maintaining indebtedness whilst BNPL is predicated on avoiding debt and increasing repayment with fees from merchants instead); certain BNPL operators (like Afterpay) do not charge interest and do not provide further instalment financing until their previous purchases have been completely repaid where history has not been established. If anyone is defaulting they’re shut off from future lending at the $10/$20/$50 stage rather than the $1000s stage on credit card that keep on extending credit with a 27% APR to boot.
Regards
Ant
27 Likes
Yes, this was all over the news. I think this is obvious FUD from Credit Karma (who contracted the survey) and the credit card companies who they represent because they are worried BNPL is a real alternative that will challenge all their businesses.
Keep in mind that the same is true for credit cards.
“The national survey of 1,000 adults found that 42 percent of all cardholders have neglected at least one card payment.”
https://www.creditcards.com/credit-card-news/late-payment-su…
… and not wanting to feel left out, credit card companies are launching BNPL products.
Citi blurs the line between credit cards and BNPL solutions with new Spot card
https://www.businessinsider.com/citi-launches-bnpl-installme…
Enjoy,
GC4P
11 Likes