Ep 03: How Hive Financial Assets Uses AI-Driven Underwriting to Power Consumer Private Credit

Groundfloor CEO Brian Dally hosts Michael Schwartz, Chief Administrative Officer of Hive Financial Assets, a direct-lending private credit fund that has raised $160 million to finance non-bank consumer lenders. Michael explains Hive’s niche approach: embedding its algorithm into partner lenders’ workflows to help consumers facing event-driven needs like auto repairs, medical bills, appliance failures, and increasingly living expenses. He contrasts Hive’s simple-interest installment loans and borrower-friendly policies with predatory payday lending, noting repeat-borrower benefits. They discuss resilience from short-duration loans and real-time model adjustments to economic changes, and outline how the Hive-Groundfloor partnership formed.00:00 Show Intro01:35 What Hive Does02:55 Private Credit Headlines05:37 Middle America Borrowers06:50 AI Underwriting Edge11:15 Unit Economics Alignment13:22 Loan Use Cases16:48 Rates Terms Collections18:30 Installment Loans Explained19:48 Why Repeat Borrowers Matter22:34 Short Duration Advantage23:39 How Partnership Formed27:38 Rapid Fire Insights32:31 Closing And Next DealsBeyond the Stock Market podcast: https://groundfloor.com/podcastConnect with Brian Dally on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bdally/Connect with Michael Schwartz on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mjschwartz4/References:Hive Financial Assets: https://www.hivefinancialassets.com/Author Erik Larson: https://eriklarsonbooks.com/about-the-author/