#ibancar has published a 2021 Q1 management report.
Spain:
We have recruited a salesperson to develop our physical “Point of Sale” network. This “offline” channel will be less competitive than the online affiliate channel and could become a stable source of leads at a potentially lower cost than the online channel. We are starting to contact loan brokers and car workshops to
distribute our loans and the first leads are starting to come in, we hope to convert the first POS loan in April.
We are also testing social network advertising and increasing our investment in SEO and other landing pages.
Our new website is being tested and once live (in April) we will be able to generate real time loan offers while users are still on the website with only the number plate of the car.
International:
We have spent a lot of time investigating countries where Ibancar could be successful and have found car title markets in many countries (USA, China, Germany, Brazil, South Africa…) and all appear to have the same zero risk approach to asset based lending which means none are 100% remote. We have not found a totally remote, online business model similar Ibancar anywhere.
Of the countries investigated the UK and Mexico stand out as the most attractive and compatible markets for Ibancar to enter in the short term.
With no barriers to entry, Mexico is an attractive market where Ibancar can replicate its Spanish trajectory of learning and growing organically without significant upfront opex. We intend to recruit a potential Country Manager and start working on a remote car title business model that resembles our Spanish model immediately and if successful we will set up operations with existing resources to validate the model in Q3 or Q4 2021.
The UK, as a regulated market, is difficult to launch without spending a significant amount on the legal fees and business set up costs required to go through the regulatory licensing process. We intend to develop a business model for this market in parallel with Mexico but will not start operations until a Series B is
completed.
Funding:
Work continues on our asset backed debt facility (a true sale mechanism to an Ibancar owned SPV) which will be set up in Spain. The facility has been seeded by an institutional investor with €2m and other investors will be joining from a minimum investment of €1m.
We will continue using P2P marketplaces where there is strong investor demand for Ibancar loans. Our European P2P partners have also expressed an interest in offering Mexican Ibancar loans to their investor base. Overall, in the current market and with our positive track record, raising enough debt to achieve our growth targets is currently not a key risk.
We finished Q1-2021 on plan in terms of both growth and performance: the planned asset book size of €1.8m was achieved and net profit was 46% ahead of plan.
Profit (loss) in Q1 2021 = € -42k