Upstart told banks its model could approve up to three times as many borrowers at the same loss rates. Dave Girouard, who once ran Google's enterprise business, had built a lender around that claim. Upstart looked past the credit score at education, job history, and many other variables. Banks and credit unions used its platform to make personal loans online. When it filed in late 2020, interest rates were near zero and investors were hungry for fintech.

A Google Executive Starts Over

Girouard left Google and founded Upstart in April 2012 with Anna Counselman and Paul Gu. Their bet was that the standard credit score shut out millions of people who would repay. Upstart trained models on loan outcomes and kept feeding them more data. Most loans went to bank partners or investors, so Upstart earned fees for sending borrowers and running the process.

Up Twentyfold, Then Down

Upstart priced its IPO at $20 a share on December 15, 2020, and began trading on Nasdaq as UPST the next day. By the fall of 2021 the stock had climbed above $300. Then interest rates rose, the investors who bought its loans pulled back, and the shares lost more than 90 percent of their value. In May 2026 co-founder Paul Gu took over as CEO, and Girouard became executive chairman. Upstart still trades as UPST.

Cover: Colts on a Norfolk Marsh, Peter Henry Emerson. Art Institute of Chicago, public domain. Chosen for young colts on a marsh (upstarts).