Backed, Inc., an online lending platform for personal loans, announced on Thursday that it has appointed Tal Yatsiv as its new CEO. Yatsiv joins the company having formerly been the CEO of Aniboom and a vice president of equity derivatives at J.P. Morgan.
Yatsiv stated:
“I’ve been truly impressed by the team and its accomplishments, particularly from a technology and product perspective. Backed’s core principles emphasize innovation, while never at the expense of strong operational controls, stringent risk management, and transparency. I believe we have all of the right pieces in place to win borrowers’ and lenders’ trust, which has never been more relevant.”
Kfir Moyal, co-founder and chairman of Backed, and general partner of Cyhawk Ventures, added:
“We are delighted to have Tal join Backed as CEO. He has a rich management experience and diverse background that will allow him to successfully lead the company to quickly adapt and react to the evolving and growing alternative lending industry.”
Prior to Yatsiv’s appointment, Backed raised $1.5 million in seed funding from angel investors, iAngels, and Cyhawk Ventures. The company stated at the time that planned to allocate about half of the funds to further developing the product, team and company, and half to customer acquisition, revenue growth and becoming profitable within a few years by capturing a share of the market – $4.7 trillion in financial services revenue at risk of being displaced by tech-enabled or fintech company entrants.
Backed also began to accept loan applications in New York, New Jersey and Florida. The loans are primarily geared towards qualified millennials without a credit history who want to build their credit score and accelerate their financial independence.