Renaud resurfaces, will launch rival to Lending Club

Former Lending Club chief executive filed paperwork for new lender within weeks of ousting.

Renaud Laplanche (pictured right), former CEO of the world’s best-known marketplace lender Lending Club, is launching a new online lending platform, just a few doors down from his old shop. Records show that Laplanche incorporated the new company, named Credify Finance, in the state of Delaware on 31 May this year, less than a month after being forced out by the Lending Club board.

Laplanche was effectively fired in early May of this year, after an internal review found that he had overseen the mis-selling of loans to an institutional investor, as well as the falsification of loan data. Former COO Scott Sanborn acceded to the top job, and has had a torrid time trying to steady the ship since, with investor confidence across the sector in sharp decline.

Laplanche’s new firm Credify has set up its offices in San Francisco, just a few doors down from Lending Club’s headquarters. The company hopes to start making loans in 2017, according to the Wall Street Journal, which has interviewed people familiar with the matter. Credify reportedly estimates generating $50m in revenues next year.

Laplanche is working on the project with a number of former Lending Club executives, including ex-capital markets heads Jeff Bogan and Adelina Grozdanova. Thomas Curran, a former employee of the regulatory consulting firm Promontory Financial Group and of the Treasury Department’s capital-purchase program, appears to be serving as Credify’s compliance officer.

Laplanche had previously been rumoured to be seeking backing from private equity firms to buy back Lending Club, taking the company private, but news of his resurgence at Credify will put these rumours to bed.

The former Lending Club boss will be speaking at Disrupt London 2016, a two day conference which kicks off 5 December.