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  • 📈 Abound Bags £250m to Ditch Dodgy Credit Scores

📈 Abound Bags £250m to Ditch Dodgy Credit Scores

Fintech Unicorn? ClearScore Eyes £1.2B Listing

March 28, 2025

This is Cliff Equity, the UK’s business newsletter that keeps you informed on what’s important in tech, business and finance in less than 5 minutes

In today’s stories:

  • Abound Bags £250m to Ditch Dodgy Credit Scores

  • Fintech Unicorn? ClearScore Eyes £1.2B Listing

  • WH Smith Becomes TGJones: High Street to Ghost Town

The summary: Abound is shaking up the UK lending game with AI-powered credit decisions, a £1.3bn funding boost, and a mission to make borrowing fairer, smarter, and refreshingly free from outdated credit score nonsense.

The details:

  • Big Bucks for Better Borrowing – AI-driven lender Abound bags a hefty £250m from Deutsche Bank to shake up UK lending, making credit fairer and cheaper with Open Banking smarts. Total funding potential now a jaw-dropping £1.3bn.

  • Smashing Old-School Credit Scores – Abound’s AI-powered Render platform ditches outdated credit models, slashing defaults by 75% and securing lower interest rates for borrowers. A smarter, data-led approach that’s winning over the big banks.

  • Brains Behind the Breakthrough – Co-founders Dr. Michelle He and Gerald Chappell bring heavyweight fintech expertise, proving AI and finance aren’t just for the old boys’ club. Dr. He’s machine learning chops are setting new standards in AI-powered lending.

  • Rivals on the Radar – As Abound expands its AI lending empire, competitors like Lendable and Zopa aren’t sitting still, snapping up their own funding to push fintech innovation. The battle for smarter, fairer loans is well and truly on.

Why it matters: Abound is giving the UK’s tired old lending system a much-needed AI-powered facelift, proving that borrowers deserve more than dusty credit scores and extortionate rates. With a war chest now hitting £1.3bn, they’re not just disrupting the market—they’re making traditional lenders look positively prehistoric. As rivals scramble to keep up, the race to make borrowing fairer, smarter, and actually affordable is heating up, and for once, it’s the customers who stand to win.

The summary: ClearScore’s £1.2 billion IPO could inject fresh energy into London’s stock market, proving that UK fintechs can scale profitably, attract investors, and inspire a new wave of homegrown public listings.

The details:

  • ClearScore’s Big Bet – The UK fintech giant, known for giving 24 million users free credit scores, is eyeing a £1.2 billion IPO on the London Stock Exchange. Could this be the much-needed boost for London’s sluggish IPO scene?

  • From Free Scores to Fat Profits – ClearScore disrupted the market by making credit information free while raking in over £100 million annually through commissions on financial products. Unlike many fintechs, it’s profitable – a rare feat!

  • Money Talks – After dodging an Experian takeover and securing major investments, ClearScore now has fresh funding from HSBC. Some say it’s gearing up for AI-driven expansion or a push into Asia-Pacific.

  • London Calling – CEO Justin Basini insists on a UK listing, seeing it as the “next chapter” rather than an exit. With a potential valuation of £1.2 billion, will ClearScore’s success inspire other fintechs like Monzo and Starling to follow suit?

Why it matters: ClearScore’s IPO could throw a much-needed lifeline to London’s struggling stock market, proving that British fintechs can still make a splash at home rather than bolting for New York. A rare breed—a profitable fintech—it challenges the notion that high-growth startups must burn cash to survive, setting a precedent for others like Monzo and Starling. If successful, it might just tempt more UK tech firms to go public, giving the London Stock Exchange something to celebrate beyond its usual fare of oil giants and house builders.

The summary: WH Smith has sold its high street business to Modella Capital for £76m, rebranding it as TGJones, while it shifts its focus to its booming travel retail arm, leaving high street stores to fend for themselves.

The details:

  • WH Smith bids farewell to the high street – After 233 years, the retailer has offloaded its struggling high street arm to Modella Capital (owner of Hobbycraft) for £76m. Say hello to TGJones, the new name set to replace WH Smith in town centres.

  • Travel triumphs over town centres – WH Smith’s leadership is ditching the dusty high street shelves to focus on its real moneymaker: airport and railway station stores. With 1,200 locations across 32 countries, this division already accounts for 85% of group profits.

  • Modella’s mystery plan – The new owners haven’t revealed how they’ll turn the business around, leaving employees and the 480-store estate in limbo. Critics have long bemoaned WH Smith’s lack of investment—will Modella breathe new life into it?

  • A deal with small change left over – While the sale was valued at £76m, WH Smith pockets just £25m after costs. Investors weren’t thrilled—shares dipped by over 1% at market open.

Why it matters: High streets are losing yet another familiar name, with WH Smith swapping dusty shelves for duty-free dominance—another sign that town centres are struggling while travel retail soars. The fate of 5,000 jobs and 480 stores now rests in Modella Capital’s hands, but with no clear rescue plan, it’s anyone’s guess whether TGJones will be a retail revival or just another rebrand on the road to ruin. Meanwhile, WH Smith walks away with £25m and a laser focus on airports and train stations—because, let’s face it, people are far more willing to impulse-buy a £4 bottle of water when they’re rushing for a flight.

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