News & Impact Stories

Broad Coalition Opposes 195% APR Bank Charter for OppFi, Which Seeks to Make Payday Loans in Every State 

July 31, 2026 — Press Release

120+ Groups Urge FDIC, OCC, and Fed To Deny OppFi’s Request to Acquire BNC Bank  

WASHINGTON – A broad coalition filed comments urging regulators to deny the application of the predatory lender Opportunity Financial (“OppFi”) to acquire a national bank. If the deal is approved, OppFi could offer loans up to 195% APR, and payday loan apps carrying even higher interest rates, in every state. 

The coalition, which includes 123 consumer, civil rights, legal services, and community organizations and academics, urged the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC), Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), and Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (FRB) to hold public hearings on the application, insist on more information from OppFi on the impact of its unaffordable loans on struggling families, and – considering OppFI’s atrocious lending record – deny the application. The National Consumer Law Center also filed a more detailed set of comments on behalf of its low-income clients.

The groups and academics argue that allowing OppFi to acquire BNC Bank would be an unprecedented use of a national bank charter to create a business model built on outrageously usurious and destructive loans that have no place in the national bank system. 

  • OppFi’s rates typically reach 160% and as high as 195%. Loans at those rates are debt traps, not responsible credit.
  • OppFi’s interest rates are illegal in up to 45 states, depending on the size of the loan. 
  • OppFi’s charge-offs are over 55%, proof of its irresponsible lending. This rate of charge-offs (a measure of amount defaulted on) has never been tolerated at national banks. 
  • OppFi’s frequent refinancing promotes long-term debt and disguises defaults. As much as 75% of OppFi’s pre-tax income comes from refinancing, and about half of OppFi customers refinance, sometimes multiple times and within two or three months of taking out the loans. Between defaults and refinances, very few OppFi borrowers repay their loans in full on the loan’s original terms.

“There is an enormous gap between the destructive, usurious rates that OppFi charges and the top rates allowed by nearly every state,” the groups wrote. “OppFi’s lending program is risky, unsafe and unsound.”

They warn that approval of OppFi’s application would deeply injure and threaten the national bank charter: “The charter would become a vehicle for predatory lending outlawed in nearly every state. National banks as a whole could also face a backlash that amplifies calls to pass legislation to end the preemption powers of national banks.”

This letter follows similar opposition to a pending request from Enova (owner of CashNetUSA, NetCredit and OnDeck) to become a national bank. 

Though Enova and OppFi try to evade some state interest rate laws, they are currently required by law to comply with them. But if they become national banks, Enova and OppFi could, under current law, evade state interest laws.  

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