March 21, 2020

Changing Climate in Consumer Lending Marketplace: What We’re Seeing and Hearing

Picture of Jim Stewart

Jim Stewart

CEO, Epic Research

What We’re Seeing

The Covid-19 pandemic has created an unprecedented environment for consumer lenders. In our daily discussions with our clients and industry contacts, everyone seems to be looking for information regarding impacts and actions among financial institutions. Below is some data, along with other anecdotal observations. Please email us your thoughts regarding this topic.

Consumer Demand

Recent rate cuts have driven spikes in demand for most lending products, including student loan refinance, personal loans, and small business loans.

Online search volume for Credit Cards and Private Student Loans is up slightly.

However, online search volume for several other products increased dramatically in the past 90 days.

Student Loan Refinance – Online Search Volume Up 400%


Personal Loan – Up 60%


Home Equity Loans – Up 100%


Small Business Loans – Up 900%

Source: Epic analysis of Google Trends

Lender Activity

Source: Epic analysis of student loan refinance aggregator sites: Credible, NerdWallet, Nitro College, Student Loan Hero

Going Forward

Across the markets that we serve, actual early results show strong increased demand from creditworthy borrowers across many lending products.

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