Affirm Holdings
Affirm Holdings, Inc. is a publicly traded financial technology company based in San Francisco, United States. The company was founded in 2012. Affirm offers a buy now, pay later (BNPL) service as an alternative to the traditional credit card, for both online and in-store purchases. The company claims to use machine learning in loan underwriting which it says boosts approval rates for borrowers, and has been cited to improve sales outcomes for partnering retailers. History Affirm was founded in 2012 by Max Levchin, Nathan Gettings, Jeffrey Kaditz, and Alex Rampell as part of the initial portfolio of startup studio HVF. Levchin, who co-founded PayPal, became CEO of Affirm in 2014. According to RACKED in November 2017, Affirm had launched an app which allowed consumers to take out loans for purchases at any retailer. The company aimed at "building and perfecting a new underwriting system", powered by machine learning, to determine consumer creditworthiness. RACKED added that the four retailers it spoke to reported "significantly higher sales and more frequent purchases, with Affirm customers". Affirm's use of machine learning in underwriting has also been claimed by the lender to generate "higher loan approval rate compared to its competitors", while ensuring the borrower