Significant interest for online loans in Indonesia: Robocash

More people in Indonesia are searching for online loans, resulting in the country overtaking its peers Vietnam and Philippines by significant margins. 

At the beginning of 2017, online loans were more popular in the Philippines whereas in Indonesia they were almost at the same level as in Vietnam according to research by Robocash Group. 

Overall, demand for online loans in all three countries is growing steadily. In January 2017 the number of searches for online loans amounted to 880. In January 2018, the number jumped to 8,100; it more than doubled to 18,100 in January 2019. 

"The growth spurt of online lending in Indonesia took place earlier than in the Philippines and Vietnam largely due to the earlier emergence of the legislation, which facilitated the process of remote identification and scoring of borrowers," said Robocash.

"Thus, the sharp increase in the number of companies and volumes of issued loans there occurred back in 2016, which affected the popularity of search requests of online loans."

The full-scale emergence of alternative lending in the Philippines began only in 2017. Today the country has several dozen companies, including international players with large capital.

In Vietnam, the number of requests is growing, but not so rapidly. This is partly due to the lack of a regulatory framework noted Robocash.