The $200 Billion Blind Spot: Why Community Lenders Keep Failing Small Business Owners

What if the real problem with small business lending isn't the banks, but that nobody's actually built the system around the business owner?

In this conversation, David sits down with Charles Kollo, Head of Innovation at BBIF, a Florida-based CDFI (Community Development Financial Institution), for a candid conversation about why the $200 billion community lending ecosystem is ripe for disruption, why CDFIs have been slow to modernize, and what it will actually take to put capital access back in the hands of business owners.

Charles brings a rare global lens to the conversation: he's built a digital bank in Sub-Saharan Africa, worked with major banking groups across Côte d'Ivoire, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, and beyond, and now applies those lessons to the U.S. CDFI space.

In this episode:

• Why CDFIs were created (and why they've been slow to innovate)
• The outdated 1970s credit scoring system that's still running the show
• Why high interest rates from alternative lenders are essentially a "laziness fee" (and what accurate risk prediction could change)
• The real victim in the lending ecosystem: the small business owner
• What mobile money in Africa can teach us about capital deployment in the U.S.
• The three ingredients needed to actually solve this problem: clarity of thought, tools, and distribution
• Why EIC may be positioned to bridge the gap

Links & Resources:

• Rethinking Capital Access for Small Businesses with Charles Kollo
• Learn more about CDFIs: cdfi.org
• Learn more about BBIF: bbif.com