Newsletter
The Lenders Cooperative Newsletter
These are heady days at Lenders Cooperative. The team members here know that something special is taking shape. The platform that we have engineered is becoming increasingly durable, adaptive, and adopted by the largest commercial lenders in the U.S. banking industry. Not everyone gets an opportunity to be a part of something like that in their careers, so I’m taking a moment for gratitude and recognition of this team.
I haven’t been more energized and inspired by a team of builders in quite some time, and I’ve had the privilege of working with some of the legends of fintech. Whether we are showing up every day at Mechanicsburg, Arlington, our Birmingham HQ, or remote offices, everyone on this team is digging deep right now, because we must. We are getting tested and we are accepting the challenges, and we’re passing the tests.
Over the course of this year, LC has entered another level of technology provision and service. We’ve crossed the threshold of software provider to system of record partner, supporting core lending operations at Tier 1 financial institutions. Taking a $200 billion FI through vendor due diligence, exhaustive UAT, and into production with closed and funded loans is an exercise that will test the mettle of a company and change it irrevocably. And for the better. We’re moving forward with higher expectations for our platform, our people, and our customers’ outcomes. That bar will only move higher now. And that creates an unmistakable momentum within a company, and we hope you feel it when you engage with us.
Keep an eye on LC, because this is getting super interesting. In the last few days we signed a $25 billion bank and one of the largest non-bank commercial lenders in the world, introduced a next-generation servicing platform to complement our origination workflow, and at the upcoming ABA Annual Conference, we’ll announce an innovative new credit risk transfer product that’s going to knock your socks off. Much more to come.
Chris McClintonPresident & Chief Revenue Officer
Lenders Cooperative has integrated two Mastercard Open Finance solutions, Payment Risk Insights and Cash Flow Analytics, into our unified lending platform. Lenders get secure, borrower-permissioned access to real-time financial data that streamlines underwriting, supports credit decisioning, and reduces manual document collection.
“By integrating Mastercard Open Finance solutions into both our origination and servicing workflows, we’re giving financial institutions a more efficient way to access borrower-permissioned financial information.”
Christopher McClinton, President & Chief Revenue Officer
Mastercard Open Finance solutions are powered by Finicity, a Mastercard company.
The latest wave of enhancements to the Lenders Cooperative unified lending platform spans Releases 9.8 through 10.0, touching nearly every stage of the loan lifecycle. Here’s what’s new in Release 10.0:
A reusable phrase library for faster, more consistent credit memos, new Risk Summary and Insurance Summary dashboards, and updated project-based spreading templates.
Improved SBA Form 1919 generation, duplicate-free Eligibility Certificate processing, WKFS closing packet validation, and more reliable E-Tran submissions.
New project and loan team assignments, configurable adverse action and Notice of Incomplete Application letters, and earlier visibility into document rejection reasons.
New lifecycle phase tracking with pipeline visibility, drill-down by stage, and audit-trail insights into bottlenecks, aging loans, and rework.
Moov integration enables secure bank account linking, recurring payments, and richer borrower visibility into payment and transaction history.
Added CRS-based bureau support for Experian and Equifax, with expanded SBSS scoring flexibility and continued FICO support.
Limited and Full Guaranty selection in Borrowing Structure, auto-populated into Underwriting, with an enhanced non-blocking Form 1919 flow.
Improved filtering, column configuration, pagination, a default Back Office landing experience, and Excel export.
Separated terminology within the LTV table plus a new Advance Rate column with calculated collateral value and tenant-level configuration.
The Funding Screen now displays Use of Proceeds alongside financed fees, with improved reconciliation against the loan amount.
Native support for MARC Lines of Credit and Term Loans, with automated eligibility validation and enforced loan-size and guaranty limits.
Reinstate applications declined in error without admin intervention, with active tasks continuing through decline approval.
Real estate document support grows from 15 states to full national coverage, with updated security instruments and disclosures.
Individual Credit, SBSS, and Lumos checks now run in sequence, cutting unnecessary third-party pulls.
A uniform, table-driven task workflow across Underwriting, Doc Prep, Pricing, and more, with fewer pop-ups.
SOP 50 10 8.1, including the Technical Policy Updates SBA issued on Friday, September 25, 2026, replaces SOP 50 10 8 for both the 7(a) and 504 programs and took effect October 1. The biggest changes affect business acquisitions and change-of-ownership lending.
The rule follows the loan number, not the application date. A file submitted in late September that doesn’t receive its SBA loan number until October falls under the new rules.
What stays the same: Franchise Directory rules, the $5 million individual 7(a) maximum, and 504 special-purpose equity are unchanged.
Arizona-based Desert Financial, a $9 billion credit union serving more than 500,000 members, is now live on our end-to-end business lending platform and uses our outsourced operational support across underwriting, processing and servicing.
Liberty Savings Bank, a community-focused institution serving Sarasota and Manatee counties in Florida, is bringing its commercial and SBA lending, from origination through servicing, into one streamlined platform to reduce friction and speed up funding.
“We were looking for a solution that could adapt to our processes—not force us into a rigid model—and Lenders Cooperative gives us that balance of control and efficiency.”
Scott Holmer, SVP – Commercial Lending
Based in Arizona, Desert Financial is a $9 billion credit union serving more than 500,000 members nationwide. It is now in production on the Lenders Cooperative end-to-end business lending platform to support the growth of its commercial and SBA lending programs.
Desert Financial uses the platform to automate origination workflows, speed up time to close, and give business members a modern digital borrowing experience. It also relies on Lenders Cooperative’s outsourced operational support to add capacity across underwriting, processing, and servicing, scaling efficiently while maintaining compliance and credit quality.
“Our focus is on delivering fast, reliable access to capital for our business members.”
Andrea Mosher, Chief Lending Officer“With Lenders Cooperative, we’ve implemented a modern lending infrastructure that combines powerful technology with the operational support needed to grow our commercial and SBA lending programs with confidence.”
Director of Software Development
Michael leads the engineering team behind the Lenders Cooperative unified lending platform. He brings more than 20 years of experience across security, hardware, networking, software design, and product lifecycle management.
A Triplebyte Certified Engineer, Michael focuses on building secure, user-friendly products and is always learning and exploring new ways to apply technology.
“What excites me most is combining our people’s expertise with AI tools designed for the work they do. That gives every team more capacity and helps move loans from document intake through funding with less friction.”
We sat down with Michael to talk about how Lenders Cooperative is putting AI to work, the opportunity it creates for lenders, and what it means for the industry.
Q1How is Lenders Cooperative using AI in the unified lending platform today, and where are lenders seeing it first?
Credit memos are one visible example: AI helps teams draft, summarize, and refine the narrative. We’re also building custom products that use large language models to streamline the broader lending process, from document intake through funding. That means connecting information, reducing repetitive work, and helping teams move a loan forward with fewer manual handoffs. The goal is to put AI to work throughout the process so lenders can spend more time on borrowers and credit decisions.
We’re lenders too. That’s why we sponsor, speak, and exhibit at conferences nationwide, supporting the banks, credit unions, and CDCs that power business lending.
Where we’ve been in 2026: ACU Business Lending Roundtable · Bank Director AOBA · NAGGL Member Meetups · ABA Conference for Community Bankers · ABA Washington Summit · SESBLC · Mid America Lending Conference · NAGGL Spring Conference · NADCO Spring Summit · OFN · America West · ACU Business Lending School · America East · SBA Minnesota Lenders Conference · FLAGGL
Interested in learning more? We’d love to hear from you. Let us know how we can help.