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Humble Brisbane boy goes from Ferny Grove to treasure trove
HE MISSES meat pies, XXXX Gold and good coffee, but for Stephen Dash, a daring move to the US seven years ago has been worth every sacrifice.
This week, Brisbane-raised Mr Dash, 35, became Australia’s newest fintech success story, selling his student loans and mortgages marketplace Credible to Fox Corporation for $585 million.
The Marist College Ashgrove old boy and University of Queensland graduate – described by friends as “gracious and humble” – said the deal was “an exciting new stage” in a business he started on his laptop in a cafe in 2012.
Mr Dash had the idea for Credible – which gives consumers pre-qualified offers of credit within three minutes – after seeing how the US mortgage industry was crippling young people trying to get ahead in their careers.
“It’s not like Australia’s pay-as-you-earn HECS debt,” he said. “In the States there were people paying more than 8 per cent interest on their loans when the bank (lending) rate was just 0.30 per cent.
“There was a massive ‘risk premium’ implied by that pricing that wasn’t justified, particularly for doctors, lawyers, accountants and other professionals who are not in cyclical jobs.” So Mr Dash, who landed in California at age 28 with one suitcase but several years’ finance experience (including a couple of dud ventures), set about offering an alternative.
Credible now processes billions of dollars a year in student loan refinancing and origination, personal loans and mortgages. In the last financial quarter alone, it did $600 million.
In the deal, due to close in October, with the Lachlan Murdoch-led Fox Corporation – sister company to News Corp,...