Today we walk through a list of questions to ask yourself to determine whether your application experience needs a tune up. ***** About The Free Toaster Podcast:

Insights and interviews at the intersection of consumer lending, marketing, and technology. Hosted by Carlos Caro, co-founder at The Free Toaster and Managing Partner at New Market Growth, a growth agency for consumer lenders. *****

***** To support The Free Toaster Podcast, please visit our sponsors:

A word from our sponsor, Spinwheel:

Reduce friction in your lending application with just two fields—phone number and birthdate. Spinwheel’s APIs boost application rates by 20-30% while also providing real-time credit data and seamless payment processing. Want to see it in action? Connect with their Head of Growth for a demo!

https://spinwheel.io/partner/?utm_source=freetoaster&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=feb

Drive thousands of new accounts and billions in deposits with the only partner marketing solution built for fintech and banking – your all-in-one affiliate platform, partner network, agency, and marketing compliance engine.

https://partner.fintelconnect.com/get-to-know-fintel-connect?utm_campaign=13897733-2025%20Partners&utm_source=The%20Free%20Toaster&utm_medium=podcast

A word from our sponsor, Bulldog Media Group: Bulldog Media Group is a leading performance marketing company that specializes in online customer acquisition for clients in the financial services industry. Since 2000, they have focused on financial services digital marketing as their core niche. https://www.bulldogmediagroup.com/

A word from our sponsor, New Market Growth:

New Market Growth helps fintech consumer lenders generate explosive growth on affiliate marketing channels like Credit Karma, Experian Marketplace, LendingTree, and others. Affiliate marketing involves marketing & credit risk expertise, and NMG's founders bring this with 21+ years of lending experience and 8+ years experience as executive affiliate operators.

If you'd like help planning or implementing your affiliate marketing strategy, email us at carlos@newmarketgrowth.com

This week Prithvi Prabhu drops in to help us contextualize Cash App Borrow's metrics from this Edition: https://www.thefreetoaster.com/p/cash-apps-invisible-200-billion-loan

Then, we discuss Mr. Beast's Fintech Acquisition and talk about why buying Fintech's could lead to trouble for the mega content creator.

Sign up for The Free Toaster Newsletter (www.thefreetoaster.com) to get our curated news at the intersection of consumer lending & marketing, published every Wednesday. And then come here on Fridays to get our hot takes on a select story (or two) from that edition. ***** To support The Free Toaster Podcast, please visit our sponsors:

A word from our sponsor, Spinwheel:

Reduce friction in your lending application with just two fields—phone number and birthdate. Spinwheel’s APIs boost application rates by 20-30% while also providing real-time credit data and seamless payment processing. Want to see it in action? Connect with their Head of Growth for a demo!

https://spinwheel.io/partner/?utm_source=freetoaster&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=feb

Drive thousands of new accounts and billions in deposits with the only partner marketing solution built for fintech and banking – your all-in-one affiliate platform, partner network, agency, and marketing compliance engine.

https://partner.fintelconnect.com/get-to-know-fintel-connect?utm_campaign=13897733-2025%20Partners&utm_source=The%20Free%20Toaster&utm_medium=podcast

A word from our sponsor, Bulldog Media Group: Bulldog Media Group is a leading performance marketing company that specializes in online customer acquisition for clients in the financial services industry. Since 2000, they have focused on financial services digital marketing as their core niche. https://www.bulldogmediagroup.com/

A word from our sponsor, New Market Growth:

New Market Growth helps fintech consumer lenders generate explosive growth on affiliate marketing channels like Credit Karma, Experian Marketplace, LendingTree, and others. Affiliate marketing involves marketing & credit risk expertise, and NMG's founders bring this with 21+ years of lending experience and 8+ years experience as executive affiliate operators.

If you'd like help planning or implementing your affiliate marketing strategy, email us at carlos@newmarketgrowth.com

The Free Toaster hosts Carlos Caro and Nick Madrid add context to the story covered in the Newsletter earlier this week. https://www.thefreetoaster.com/p/wtf-2026-since-when-is-debit-now

Sign up for The Free Toaster Newsletter (www.thefreetoaster.com) to get our curated news at the intersection of consumer lending & marketing, published every Wednesday. And then come here on Fridays to get our hot takes on a select story from that edition. ***** To support The Free Toaster Podcast, please visit our sponsors:

Drive thousands of new accounts and billions in deposits with the only partner marketing solution built for fintech and banking – your all-in-one affiliate platform, partner network, agency, and marketing compliance engine.

https://partner.fintelconnect.com/get-to-know-fintel-connect?utm_campaign=13897733-2025%20Partners&utm_source=The%20Free%20Toaster&utm_medium=podcast

A word from our sponsor, Bulldog Media Group: Bulldog Media Group is a leading performance marketing company that specializes in online customer acquisition for clients in the financial services industry. Since 2000, they have focused on financial services digital marketing as their core niche. https://www.bulldogmediagroup.com/

A word from our sponsor, Spinwheel:

Reduce friction in your lending application with just two fields—phone number and birthdate. Spinwheel’s APIs boost application rates by 20-30% while also providing real-time credit data and seamless payment processing. Want to see it in action? Connect with their Head of Growth for a demo!

https://spinwheel.io/partner/?utm_source=freetoaster&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=jan

A word from our sponsor, New Market Growth:

New Market Growth helps fintech consumer lenders generate explosive growth on affiliate marketing channels like Credit Karma, Experian Marketplace, LendingTree, and others. Affiliate marketing involves marketing & credit risk expertise, and NMG's founders bring this with 21+ years of lending experience and 8+ years experience as executive affiliate operators.

If you'd like help planning or implementing your affiliate marketing strategy, email us at carlos@newmarketgrowth.com