US financial inclusion fintech Nova Credit has expanded into the UK today with plans to open up access to credit for immigrants across Europe.
The San Francisco-headquartered firm, which partners with global credit bureaus to those help those typically locked out of accessing credit, is opening a London office with plans to serve the whole European market, the firm announced.
Bosses at Nova have said the expansion would help drive financial inclusion among a growing and underserved section of the market.
“Millions of immigrants cross borders every year to work, study and establish new lives for themselves and their families,” said Collin Galster, director of Nova Credit UK.
“In doing so, they leave years of credit history behind them, ‘stuck’ in the countries they’ve left. The majority of these individuals are creditworthy, yet underserved.”
Galster said Nova was aiming to provide a solution to a system which had so far failed immigrants, and has already partnered with credit bureaus in over 20 countries to take data and standardise it into a format readily accepted by US lenders and financial services providers.
The firm says it is now looking to tap into a market of 3.5m immigrants in the UK who have little or no credit history but who could be categorised as creditworthy borrowers based on the data in their country of origin.
