PayPal launches its pro financing offer in France

In order to extend its offers beyond the payment sector, PayPal France has just presented a new financing offer entirely dedicated to professionals. VSEs and SMEs are particularly targeted since, according to a study supported by PayPal, they are still struggling to find financing from traditional players.

FACTS

• PayPal has just introduced PayPal Financement Pro in France. This financing solution is particularly adapted to the needs of small and medium-sized businesses.

• PayPal Financement Pro represents an extension of the services of PayPal Commerce Platform, which offers various services to SMEs and VSEs to facilitate their activity.

• The new offer is first and foremost presented as reactive, allowing PayPal's small and medium-sized customers in France to obtain financing in just a few minutes, thanks to an online application process combined with an accelerated funds release system (PayPal's financing approval is based on the history of its customers' merchant accounts).

• The second promise of this offer is its ability to provide personalised and responsible financing, with repayments tailored to the activities of their target. Indeed, the loans granted by PayPal Financement Pro are not subject to fixed repayment periods. Repayments are taken according to a rate applied to the PayPal sales revenue of borrowing customers. This rate, negotiated upstream by PayPal and its customer, is set between 10 and 30% per sale.

CHALLENGES

• Expand its offerings: PayPal Financement Pro was previously offered by PayPal on four markets, namely the United States, Australia, the United Kingdom and Germany. Today, VSEs and SMEs in France, but also in the Netherlands, can subscribe to this offer. Since its initial launch in the US in 2013, PayPal Finance Pro has provided over $22 billion in capital funding to local VSEs and SMEs via more than 1.1 million loans granted. In Europe, these figures have reached more than $3.6 billion in capital delivered to businesses through more than 230,000 loans granted.

• Overcoming the shortcomings of the traditional system: According to a YouGov study commissioned by PayPal, 57% of French VSE/SME managers said they had not obtained financing because of the requirements of financial institutions. Their requests for loans were related to cash flow needs (31%), their development (26%) or the purchase of supplies (20%).

• Accelerate the process: 29% of the companies questioned within the framework of the YouGov study for PayPal also put forward a major problem concerning the too long duration of the procedures of requests for financing and the release of the funds on the traditional circuit. And PayPal Financement Pro presents itself as a solution for simplifying and accelerating financing for professionals. This promise is all the more important as for 47% of VSE/SME managers, the responsiveness of the credit organisation's customer service is the main criterion for making a decision.

MARKET PERSPECTIVE

• Online payment giant PayPal is unveiling its Digital Wallet, a digital wallet that incorporates new "everyday banking" features in September 2021. The objective of this approach was then assumed: to impose PayPal as a Super-App rather than a simple online payment service.

• Since then, PayPal has been working to defend this strategy by continuing its efforts to diversify its services. With some success, as evidenced in particular by a credit offer developed by the group around the current theme of BNPL.

• Today, PayPal is particularly focused on financing for professionals to continue building its broad and varied range of financial services, ultimately a bank without a bank.