The Buy Now, Pay Later Bubble Is About to Burst

The Buy Now, Pay Later Bubble Is About to Burst(theatlantic.com)

6 points by nowandlater 3 years ago | 4 comments

sbuccini 3 years ago |

This article is so weak. It doesn't provide any actual reasons for why BNPL is a bubble nor why such a supposed bubble is about to burst. Seriously quotes TikTokers who are probably just paid shills for the company.

There are real issues with BNPL, mostly extremely loose underwriting in the pursuit of growth, but realistically it's no different than a credit card. People actually interested in this topic should look at the CFPB's recent report on the subject and at the quarterly reports for Affirm/Upstart/Square/etc.

Nextgrid 3 years ago | |

> realistically it's no different than a credit card

That's the point, people already have perfectly functional credit cards. How is BNPL so much better that it will enough profits to provide the astronomical returns VCs desire?

sbuccini 3 years ago | | |

Actually they don't. The Harvard economist quoted in the article states that most BNPL users don't have or don't use a credit card.

tinalumfoil 3 years ago |

> If credit dries up in a broader downturn, they are at risk of losing access even to those programs. Meanwhile, they may find that their reliance on these parallel lending methods, which only glancingly intersect with the conventional credit ecosystem, has hobbled their credit history at the worst possible time.

This is the only evidence I could find in the article for the title. Half the article is quoting influencers. Absolute click-bait.