Tanyapong Thamavaranukupt, co-president of Thai fintech Ascend Cash, sees spending patterns—like journal subscriptions or cellular payments—as a sign of creditworthiness, significantly in markets like Southeast Asia which have each a big underbanked inhabitants and underdeveloped monetary establishments.
“We don’t rely on traditional data to make our loan decisions,” he instructed Fortune. As an alternative, Ascend Cash’s lending service, Ascend Nano, depends on knowledge from the corporate’s digital pockets, a service used to retailer and transact cash, and make funds. “We can see what types of transactions users make, where they use their money, the type of phone they’re using,” he explains.
That may construct a threat profile of a buyer that doesn’t depend on conventional proof, like monetary statements, payslips, or a credit score bureau evaluation. Take {a magazine} subscription: Tanyapong suggests {that a} consumer who often reads a publication is likely to be barely extra educated, and so might have the next revenue–and so could also be a safer particular person for Ascend to lend to.
Tanyapong reckons that about 20 million Thais, out of a bigger inhabitants of 70 million, ought to have the ability to entry a mortgage. But the nation’s formal banks are solely lending to about 5 million prospects. That leaves round 15 million Thais who can’t get entry to financing despite the fact that they could be creditworthy. “It’s not because they’re not qualified,” Tanyapong says. “It’s simply because the traditional players … use the exact same model that’s been there for the last 30 years.”
Micro- and small-sized companies usually don’t have monetary statements, which means they’ll’t persuade banks to supply them a mortgage. Many conventional lenders additionally depend on credit score bureaus, which don’t cowl many underbanked folks, once more denying them entry to financing.
If banks don’t step in, mortgage sharks will
Monetary entry is a regional downside. Round 225 million folks in Southeast Asia lacked entry to a proper checking account in 2021, in line with calculations by the Middle for Affect Investing and Practices. Round 350 million couldn’t get entry to formal financing. Moreover, the SME Finance Discussion board in 2018 calculated that greater than half of the area’s SMEs couldn’t get entry to financing.
Those who want cash then flip to casual lenders, who can cost exorbitantly excessive rates of interest. Tanyapong says Ascend Cash’s nano loans may also help get folks out of the casual lending market, the place mortgage sharks can cost as a lot as 20% curiosity per thirty days. (Ascend Nano, by comparability, costs simply 2%.)
Ascend isn’t the one firm in Southeast Asia trawling buyer knowledge to construct threat profiles. Seize, Southeast Asia’s most profitable super-app, has tried to make use of knowledge gleaned from its ride-hailing and GrabPay providers to evaluate creditworthiness. Different regional platforms, just like the Philippines’ GCash and Vietnam’s Momo, additionally use knowledge collected from their digital wallets to assist lengthen loans to customers.
Ascend Cash is the fintech arm for Thailand’s CP Group, a serious conglomerate with pursuits in retail, agriculture, and manufacturing. Ascend began with funds and cash switch, however low margins pushed the corporate to develop to different monetary providers. Ascend Nano was one of many firm’s first initiatives, offering “nano finance,” tiny loans that may be as little as $20, to customers and small enterprises in Thailand.
Ascend Cash’s work offering financing to Thailand’s unbanked and underbanked populations helped get the fintech firm onto Fortune’s 2025 “Change the World” listing, which acknowledges companies that do good by means of their enterprise fashions.
Ascend Nano’s ties to the broader CP Group additionally assist it discover new prospects. Tanyapong notes that a lot of their purchasers, significantly people who run small roadside stalls, purchase their merchandise wholesale from the broader conglomerate. “Based on their purchase history, we can give them a credit line to buy from CP Makro [the CP Group’s cash-and-carry wholesaler],” he explains, persevering with that prospects have managed to develop their enterprise by as much as two instances their working capital.
Tanyapong spent 15 years in Thailand’s finance trade, together with stints at GE Capital (Thailand) and KrungSri Ayudhya Financial institution. He then led retail banking at Krungthai Financial institution, one of many highest-ranked Thai corporations on the Southeast Asia 500, at No. 57. He joined Ascend Cash as its co-president in 2016.
Small-scale lending is a aggressive market. The highest 5% of providers seize half the area’s customers, in line with a 2025 report from Bain, Temasek, and Google. The remainder is served by a “long tail of smaller, aggressive apps” in markets with excessive demand for “fast credit.” Half of those providers shut inside two years.
Ascend can be taking a look at different, “nano-” variations of monetary providers, together with insurance coverage and investing. “We often find our customers don’t even have insurance,” Tanyapong says. “We have more than ten million motorcycle drivers, and they’re always getting into accidents.”
