Klarna is reportedly selling a portfolio of installment loans as it prepares to go public.
The planned sale involves a portfolio of U.S. “Pay in 4” loans from the company’s buy now, pay later (BNPL) offering, the Financial Times (FT) reported Tuesday (Jan. 14), citing sources familiar with the matter.
Banks such as Citigroup, RBC, Nordea, and Société Générale are taking part in the talks about the sale, three of the sources added.
The FT notes that this sale would help generate capital for loan growth to satisfy investors in Klarna’s long-awaited initial public offering (IPO), set to happen this year. Klarna last year sold its BNPL portfolio in Great Britain to investment fund Elliott Management.
As the name implies, the “Pay in 4” option lets consumers divide purchases from retailers into four interest-free payments, payable every two weeks. Klarna offers a similar model in the U.K. — “Pay in 3” — though one source told FT the company’s U.S. BNPL loans are less established, and thus could suffer higher defaults.
PYMNTS has contacted Klarna for comment but has not yet gotten a reply.
The company’s IPO plans come at a time when — as covered here earlier this month — pay-later plans are changing the way consumers manage their spending, and how merchants engage with their customers.
“For consumers, pay later plans offer flexibility and financial relief. More than 56% of consumers used installment payment options in the last year,” that report said.
“PYMNTS finds that consumers are happy with these plans, with 76% of buy now, pay later users reporting high levels of satisfaction. These plans help consumers pay for essentials and large purchases alike.”
And pay-later plans can serve as a financial lifeline for individuals living paycheck to paycheck and struggling to pay bills. These people are four times more likely to use card installment plans than non-paycheck-to-paycheck consumers. High-income consumers who live paycheck to paycheck are the most likely to use these installment options in the coming year.
At the same time, the BNPL sector has gotten the attention of U.S. regulators.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) called for more research into BNPL this week after finding that BNPL borrowers held higher balances on other credit lines.
A report from the consumer watchdog agency found that more than one-fifth of consumers with a credit report used BNPL loans in 2022. That research has found that more than 60% of BNPL users had simultaneous BNPL loans, nearly two-thirds of BNPL loans were granted to people with credit scores that were subprime or lower.
Articul8 has launched a family of GenAI models built to optimize supply chain, manufacturing and industrial process operations.
The new A8-SupplyChain models are domain-specific and have the deep contextual understanding needed to autonomously translate complex technical documentation into structured, actionable sequences, the company said in a Friday (April 4) press release.
“We built A8-SupplyChain specifically to tackle the problems that general-purpose GenAI can’t: delivering accurate, transparent and fully traceable reasoning through complex technical documentation and real-world workflows,” Articul8 Founder and CEO Arun Subramaniyan said in the release. “This is not just another model — it’s a fully autonomous system built specifically for mission-critical environments.”
The A8-SupplyChain models support complex enterprise production environments and platforms, including customers and partners, according to the release.
They can use unstructured data, including PDFs, engineering diagrams, maintenance logs, quality systems and structured tables, the release said.
Because they are trained on high-fidelity technical documentation, the models deliver AI-driven recommendations without extensive manual customization, per the release.
“With A8-SupplyChain, we’re giving aerospace and defense leaders something new: a fully orchestrated system that doesn’t just generate answers — it understands, adapts and drives outcomes,” Subramaniyan said in the release. “This is the next leap forward in enterprise AI — intelligent systems that operate at scale, with context, precision and trust built in.”
Enterprises are turning to AI to automate not just repetitive tasks but also more complex processes like compliance monitoring, fraud detection and supply chain optimization, PYMNTS reported in January.
Articul8 was established in January 2024 by Intel and DigitalBridge Group, which joined forces to create it as an independent company that provides enterprise customers with a secure and vertically optimized GenAI software platform.
The company’s platform enables business to harness the power of AI while keeping their data secure; offers a turnkey GenAI software platform that delivers speed, security and cost-efficiency to large enterprise customers; and supports a range of hybrid infrastructure alternatives, allowing customers to choose cloud, on-premises or hybrid deployment options.
Today, in addition to the new A8-SupplyChain, Articul8 offers domain-specific models for various industries, including energy and semiconductor, according to the Friday press release.
