Update: 2021-08-23

Hello everyone! We have a couple of very exciting announcements to share with the community:

1. The first Borrower Pool involving Backers will be provide financing to Almavest. This pool will be open to everyone outside of the US. Due diligence will start today, and the the pool will be open for funding next week. You can read more about how to participate in the Almavest Pool here: https://www.notion.so/goldfinchfinance/Almavest-Borrower-Pool-Overview-273f06e986ae444b93c445306fa05c63.

2. We are setting up our very first community call featuring Mike and Blake! The call will start around 9:30 AM US Pacific time this Wednesday (Aug 25) and will probably run about 40 minutes. The first 20 minutes will provide a quick intro to the protocol and a status update, and the second 20 minutes will focus more on questions from the community. Please feel free to submit any comments / questions / feedback here: https://forms.gle/RJdKf2MC2zkczztf7. Mike and Blake may also answer some live questions if there is time! We will share a link to the community call here when we're live. We will also try to share a link to a recording of the call for community members who are not able to make the event.

Our 1st community call starts in about 5 minutes. Check it out here: https://youtu.be/Jc1q_DXIC_g

Here is the recording for anyone who missed it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jc1q_DXIC_g.

Update: 2021-08-31

We just had the first successful borrower pool funded! Thank you to the 72 backers who filled it within 30 minutes 😱. You can see it here: https://app.goldfinch.finance/pools/0xefeB69eDf6B6999B0e3f2Fa856a2aCf3bdEA4ab5. Almavest (https://almavest.com/) will use the capital to invest in a) inclusive projects including microfinance and small businesses and b) carbon reduction project developers. Supporting both underserved borrowers and the environment!

Update: 2021-09-10

The Goldfinch community is excited to announce a $500,000 Bug Bounty program in partnership with Immunefi. More details here: https://medium.com/goldfinch-fi/goldfinch-community-announces-500k-bug-bounty-program-through-immunefi-32a8d24ec70f

Update: 2021-09-13

The Goldfinch community is thrilled to announce the launch of the Goldfinch Flight Academy - a program for Backers to learn and teach one another about global debt capital markets. More details on the program and how to get involved here: https://medium.com/goldfinch-fi/goldfinch-community-launches-flight-academy-a-program-for-backers-to-learn-and-teach-about-global-4c470fd65938.

Update 2021-09-15

We have a couple very exciting announcements to make this week in preparation for what will be a very busy next few months!

1. New Investments - We are very excited to announce that Almavest (https://www.almavest.com/) has just drawn down on another credit line from the protocol. This brings the total amount the protocol has deployed to $12.7M! With the latest capital made available through the Goldfinch protocol, Almavest will be able to support Oya - an asset financier, providing loans helping small and medium-sized businesses scale-up across Africa.

2. Senior Pool - In anticipation of a pipeline that's shaping up to be >$200m of loans to real-world fintechs who are driving financial inclusion across the globe, we are going to start increasing the Senior Pool capacity. We will begin by raising the Senior pool cap by $5m (to a total of $25M), this Thursday 16th September at 9am PST.

Read more here: https://medium.com/goldfinch-fi/goldfinch-supports-almavests-4-9m-investment-into-oya-group-raises-the-senior-pool-to-25m-e0de96cafb8c.

Hi all, the Senior Pool cap has now been raised to $40M. You can access the Senior Pool here: https://app.goldfinch.finance/earn. You must be registered in order to access the Pool, and can do that here: https://app.goldfinch.finance/verify. Please do not send funds directly to the Senior Pool contract.

How does Goldfinch bring DeFi to the real world? Read more in this week's edition of The Flip Notes: https://theflip.africa/newsletter/bringing-defi-to-the-real-world-tfn-71/.

QuickCheck was among the first Borrowers using the Goldfinch protocol. Check out Goldfinch's first Borrower Spotlight, featuring a customer of QuickCheck in Nigeria: https://medium.com/goldfinch-fi/goldfinch-borrower-spotlight-quickcheck-c184df363361

Engineers working on the Goldfinch protocol meet weekly for a "Security Lunch Hour." This week, they focused on understanding the recent issue with Compound. Read their detailed analysis in this Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/gregan8/status/1443755950804856840.

Is Ethereum the most inclusive institution in history? Blake outlines an argument for why this is true in this week's installment of Crypto Thoughts. Read more here: https://medium.com/goldfinch-fi/crypto-thoughts-ethereum-is-the-most-inclusive-economic-institution-ever-3c7596d96b73

Excited to announce that the Goldfinch protocol has partered with Nexus Mutual to offer Senior Pool LPs and Backers smart contract insurance. Read more about the partnership and how to get coverage here: https://medium.com/goldfinch-fi/goldfinch-protocol-partners-with-nexus-mutual-to-offer-smart-contract-insurance-to-senior-pool-lps-f3cc61282832

Our 2nd Community Call will get started in about 10 minutes. Check it out here: https://youtu.be/29Ns7BTVUR0

In case you missed it, here is the recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29Ns7BTVUR0

Watch Sam from the Goldfinch team share more info about using Goldfinch protocol loans as a new source of non-dilutive capital for real-world businesses: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ej6KQfdCsUY

The Goldfinch protocol has just provided Tugende, an asset-financing company empowering East-African entrepreneurs, with a $5M loan. This brings the total loans deployed through the protocol to $17.7M. Read more here: https://medium.com/goldfinch-fi/goldfinch-provides-tugende-with-a-5m-debt-facility-to-scale-its-operations-in-kenya-86ca5c8de615

We're excited to introduce Unique Identity (UID), the first NFT for identity! This is a big deal for DeFi. Read more about the UID here: https://medium.com/goldfinch-fi/introducing-unique-identity-uid-the-first-nft-for-identity-830a89207509 | https://twitter.com/goldfinch_fi/status/1455600602281512961. Learn how to get your UID here: https://docs.goldfinch.finance/goldfinch/unique-identity-uid/for-users. Check out the NFT animation here on Opensea: https://opensea.io/assets/0xba0439088dc1e75f58e0a7c107627942c15cbb41/0.

The Goldfinch community is excited to share that the second Borrower Pool involving Backers will be providing $5 million to Cauris: https://www.caurisfinance.com/ - a credit fund created to bring decentralized financing to fintechs around the world. Due diligence will start tomorrow (2021-11-03), and the pool will be open for funding next week. You can read more about the Cauris Borrower Pool here: https://www.notion.so/1b121107eaaf411c9404028304d418f8.

Please note that this offer is only available to Backers outside the US who have minted their Unique ID NFT. You can learn more about Unique ID (UID) here: https://medium.com/goldfinch-fi/introducing-unique-identity-uid-the-first-nft-for-identity-830a89207509 and follow this step-by-step guide (https://docs.goldfinch.finance/goldfinch/unique-identity-uid/for-users) to mint your UID. We will make an announcement tomorrow once due diligence begins, but in the meantime, you can get started by minting your UID today. And for all those who just finished Flight Academy, we hope you're excited to put your Pilot skills to the test.

Very excited to share that all code related to the Goldfinch protocol, including the front-ends has officially been open sourced. Read about it here! https://medium.com/goldfinch-fi/open-sourcing-the-goldfinch-protocol-4365eb1d2a87