creditshelf
The business, the turning points, and the decisions behind them.
01 / WHAT IT BUILT
What the company did
creditshelf AG was a Frankfurt-based pioneer in digital SME financing in Germany, founded in 2014 and led by CEO Dr. Tim Thabe with founding partners Dr. Daniel Bartsch (COO/CFO) and Mark Miller. The first-ever fintech company listed on Germany's Prime Standard index, it operated an online credit platform arranging senior unsecured loans of €100,000 to €5,000,000 (average €1 million, average tenor 29 months) to the German Mittelstand - companies chronically underserved by banks. Its fully automated, data-driven credit process gave feedback within 48 hours and funded in as little as three days, with around 80 percent of customers returning; by 2020 it had arranged more than €370 million in loans from over €5 billion in requests. Institutional investors funded the loans through a closed-end Creditshelf Loan Fund (up to €150 million, backed by the European Investment Fund under the Juncker Plan) and digital securitisations with CrossLend, earning gross returns of 8-9 percent. The company reached break-even for the first time in Q1 2022, posting €555,100 in core earnings on €2.37 million in revenues. In April 2024 Swiss lending platform Teylor acquired creditshelf's key operating assets in an asset deal, with Thabe and Bartsch joining Teylor.
02 / creditshelf FAILURE REASONS
Failure factors supported by the current evidence
creditshelf AG's 31 Jan 2024 MAR ad-hoc (distributed 1 Feb 2024) states that after failed talks, main shareholder Obotritia Capital KGaA would not pay a committed shareholder-loan tranche or a committed junior tranche into Silver Bullet Funding DAC; management therefore no longer treated Obotritia's hard comfort letter as reliable and said key assumptions of the positive going-concern forecast were no longer fulfilled, prompting a Schutzschirm (InsO §270d) filing.
Obotritia did not pay a legally committed, drawn shareholder-loan tranche and a committed junior tranche into Silver Bullet Funding DAC.
Management said Obotritia's hard letter of comfort was no longer predominantly reliable and the positive going-concern forecast assumptions were no longer fulfilled.
03 / EVENT HISTORY
Events in the structured record
- Bankruptcy
EQS ad-hoc 7 Feb 2024: Amtsgericht Frankfurt am Main ordered protective-shield proceedings under InsO §270d in provisional self-administration on creditshelf AG's petition; RA Dr. Robert Schiebe appointed provisional administrator.
- Bankruptcy
EQS ad-hoc 23 Apr 2024: in the ordered Schutzschirm, management signed a conditional purchase of almost all material assets and business operations to Teylor AG (Switzerland); proceeds to satisfy creditors. Later EQS 25 Jun 2024: operations transferred 6 May 2024 via übertragende Sanierung.
04 / CONTEMPORARY REBUILD ASSESSMENT
Difficulty of rebuilding this project today
Material for this section is being gathered and checked. It will appear here once ready.
Overall assessment: Not completed
05 / CAUSAL CHAIN
How the factors connect
- 01
Founded in 2014 in Frankfurt, it became Germany's first Prime Standard-listed fintech, led by CEO Dr. Tim Thabe.
- 02
It arranged over €370 million in loans (roughly $388 million) and reached breakeven in the first quarter of 2022 with core earnings of €555,000 (roughly $583,000).
- 03
After entering bankruptcy proceedings in 2024, its core operating assets were acquired by Swiss lender Teylor in an asset deal in April 2024.
- 04
No audited loss figure was publicly disclosed.