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Digital lender Lendingkart has raised Rs 50 crore through an issue of non-convertible debentures (NCDs) on a private placement basis to the Netherlands-based development finance institution, Triodos Investment Management. 

The fintech, founded by Harshvardhan Lunia and Mukul Sachan in 2014, provides short-term working capital loans to small and medium businesses (SMBs). 

In a ROC filing dated June 29, 2022, the company board accorded for allotment of 500 secured, unlisted, transferable, redeemable, NCDs having a face value of Rs 1 lakh, aggregating to Rs 50 crore to Triodos Sicav II – Triodos Microfinance Fund (Rs 35 crore) and Triodos Funds B.V. – Triodos Fair Share Fund (Rs 15 crore), respectively. 

The NCDs were offered at 11.50 percent per annum for a period of up to 72 months, subject to a put option and/or a call option after the expiry of 36 months, from the deemed date of allotment on a private placement basis. 

The debt was raised for funding the ongoing business purposes, including expansion of the company’s loan portfolio, including micro, small and medium enterprises. 

Post the closure of this round, Lendingkart has an outstanding debt of about Rs 1,168.59 crore.

Future borrowings consent, onboarding new investors

The board also accorded the firm to borrow Rs 1,250 crore via any type of NCDs (private placement) at any time in future, to meet the funding requirements, including general corporate purposes or repayment of existing borrowings. 

The resolution for the same was passed in November 2021. As per sources, the group is looking to raise more funding in the immediate further from a slew of new investors, including both domestic and foreign.

Lendingkart Group provides short-term working capital loans and other financial products to SME borrowers under Lendingkart Finance Limited—a non-deposit-taking NBFC arm of Lendingkart Group. it claims to have evaluated nearly half a million applications, disbursing over 1,40,000 loans to over 1,20,000 MSMEs in 4,000+ cities and towns across states.

To date, Lendingkart has disbursed more than $1 billion worth of loans, it says.

The group has received an equity infusion of about Rs 1,050 crore to date and over Rs 5,000 crore in debt funding, from investors like Fullerton Financial Holdings (a unit of Singapore’s Temasek Holdings), Saama Capital, Mayfield India, India Quotient, Bertelsmann India Investments, and Sistema Asia Fund.