Phoenix, Arizona - Attorney General Mark Brnovich announced today the approval of three more Arizona FinTech Sandbox participants, Align Income Share Funding, Inc., ENIAN, Ltd., and Verdigris Holdings Inc. The program, which was launched in August of 2018, now has six participants.
Align Income Share Funding, Inc. will test a business model that offers income-sharing agreements, which allows a consumer to receive an amount of money in exchange for an agreed upon percentage of the consumer’s income for a set time period. Align seeks to demonstrate that income-sharing arrangements are different from consumer loans, in particular because there is no set amount that must be repaid by a consumer and under certain circumstances, Align may receive less or none of what was provided to a consumer (such as in the case of involuntary unemployment). Participating in the Arizona sandbox will provide regulatory certainty to Align as it seeks to demonstrate that it is a different service than consumer lending and should not be regulated as such. Ultimately, the Department of Financial Institutions will determine whether a consumer lending license is required at the end of the two-year testing period.
ENIAN, Ltd. is a U.K. company expanding to the Arizona market as an investment advisor through its participation in the Arizona FinTech Sandbox. ENIAN, Ltd., will test an algorithm-based evaluation tool for potential solar and wind power projects looking for funding. This tool will enable investors to compare potential investment opportunities and will encourage more investment in renewable energy projects and assets.
“ENIAN is grateful for the opportunity to work alongside the Arizona FinTech Sandbox team on a revolutionary new machine learning algorithm that predicts investment returns for the fast-growing Arizona solar and wind energy sector with target 98% accuracy,” said CEO of ENIAN Phillip Bruner.
Verdigris will test a custom payment platform designed to provide low cost, straightforward money transmission services for a small group of Arizona consumers to ensure its services infrastructure is sound while Verdigris seeks a banking charter. Ultimately, Verdigris aims to obtain a banking charter to provide additional services to primarily unbanked or underbanked consumers.
“Over 63 million Americans are unbanked or underbanked and as a result they have to overpay for standard banking services. At Verdigris we’re setting out to change that,” said Michael Coughlan, Chief Executive Officer for Verdigris Holdings, Inc. “Thanks to the foresight of the Arizona Attorney General’s Office and the FinTech Sandbox program, we will be able to bring our platform to real customers - taking an important step to solve a significant problem for people not only in Arizona but across the United States.”
Arizona’s first-in-the-nation FinTech Sandbox launched in August 2018 to ease regulatory burdens for entrepreneurs and businesses testing innovative FinTech products and services while remaining subject to Arizona’s consumer protection laws. A complete list of Sandbox participants is on the attorney general's website.