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CreditMax Receives Growth Equity to Expand NDSE Consumer Debt Exchange

Market Leading Exchange Poised to Expand and Offer Debt Financing

West Palm Beach, Fla., August 9, 2010—CreditMax, a leading electronic exchange for the sale and purchase of distressed consumer debt, today announced it has received a growth equity investment from PPF Finance LLC, a subsidiary of PartnerRe Ltd. (PRE:NYSE) (“PartnerRe”) and Metropolitan Equity Partners. The investment is designed to enable the rapid expansion of CreditMax’s NDSE Trading Platform and the launch of CreditMax’s debt lending program for qualified debt buyers.

CreditMax has been a leader in enabling electronic trading of distressed consumer debt since the launch of the NDSE in 2006. CMAX former CEO said, “Leveraging our network of over 4,500 participants has enabled us to match buyers and sellers and maximize value for all parties. Today’s market needs our services more than ever, and debt buyers need inexpensive sources of financing to facilitate debt purchases.”

CreditMax’s NDSE exchange enables sellers to list debt for sale on a national, regional, state, local, or even account-specific basis. The platform enables buyers to identify and analyze portfolios in an efficient manner and to acquire those assets that have the most value to them.

The capital investment is being used to expand operations to increase the supply of debt on the NDSE, as well as to provide financing on terms commercially unavailable elsewhere to debt buyers. “The dislocation that our industry experienced in 2008-2009,” said Michael Bernstein, President of CMAX, “has created a significant need for new financing with interest rates as low as 6% with no lender upside participation and with rare exception, no personal guarantees. CMAX financing enables debt buyers to absorb the robust supply of distressed consumer debt being offered today.”

A substantial portion of the growth capital is being allocated to CreditMax’s debt finance program for qualified debt buyers. “The investment from PartnerRe and Metropolitan Equity,” said format CEO Mr. Kass, “enables us to offer financial leverage to a range of debt buyers, from smaller buyers seeking $50,000 for spot trades to larger buyers seeking multi-million Dollar flow agreements.”

“Today’s announcement is all about expanding the liquidity on CreditMax’s NDSE exchange and launching our new debt financing program,” said COO Michael Bernstein. “We are incredibly excited about our unprecedented pipeline of fresher debt, some of which will be coming direct from issuer, that we will be listing on the NDSE in the coming weeks. Much of this paper will be supplied by new strategic client relationships, which we expect to be ongoing sources for this kind of product.”

CreditMax is well positioned to serve as a central clearinghouse for buyers and sellers. Sasha Grutman, Special Partner of Metropolitan Equity Partners, explained, “As investors, we have seen what pricing transparency, electronic efficiency, and a deeply experienced capital markets team have done for numerous other financial services verticals. CreditMax will bring those same benefits to the distressed consumer debt industry.”

PartnerRe and Metropolitan Equity Partners join a company board that includes Advisory Members Les Biller, former Vice Chairman of Wells Fargo, Herb Lurie, former Head of Merger & Acquisitions Financial Services Banking, Merrill Lynch, and Michael Hayward, former Vice Chairman of Fleet First Boston.

About CreditMax

CreditMax is a leading financial services exchange specializing in the purchase and sale of charged-off credit card and consumer receivables. Working with leading issuers and debt sellers, CreditMax’s NDSE Exchange offers purchase and sale options custom-tailored to meet the needs of today’s debt buyers and debt sellers. CreditMax is now offering leverage financing to its approved buyer and reseller clients to enable them to buy portfolios with financing not typically offered in today’s market. As a technology-based exchange, CMAX supports trading of virtually all types of consumer debt.

About PartnerRe

PartnerRe Ltd. (NYSE, Euronext: PRE) is a Bermuda-based reinsurance company and a leading provider of risk-assumption solutions for the global insurance and capital markets. For more information please visit www.partnerre.com.

About Metropolitan Equity Partners

Metropolitan Equity Partners is private equity investment manager that focuses on lower-middle market and growth-stage companies. Metropolitan seeks to align itself with management teams in leading companies with revenue up to $50 million, and takes a hands-on approach to building value in its portfolio companies. For more information please visit www.metropolitanequity.com.

Safe Harbor Statement

The information contained in this press release contains forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are subject to the inherent uncertainties in predicting future results and conditions. Certain factors could cause actual results and conditions to differ materially from those projected in these forward-looking statements, and these factors are enumerated in the company's periodic filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The Original CreditMax Concept

The original ideas behind CreditMax were conceived by our CEO Stephen B. Kass in 2001 when he was asked to review a collections project his associate, COO Michael Bernstein was working on. After reviewing the project Mr. Kass identified opportunities in the collections industry based around the compensation of debt collectors and the ability to resell debt on the back end of the collection cycle.

After spending some time working with this project Mr. Kass realized that the liquidation rates of a collections organization could be increased dramatically by having only the best collectors work the accounts. Historically in the debt collections industry when a debt buyer outsourced the collection of their debt to a third party agency, that agency would assign a random set of collectors comprised of varying skill levels to work the accounts. Mr. Kass understood that by isolating the best collectors you could collect more than if you had some collectors at each skill level. The biggest challenge faced was getting collection agencies to assign only their best collectors to the CMAX owned accounts. CMAX has developed technology, management practices, compensation plans and a culture which rewards both collectors and agency owners based on performance.

Click Here to Read an Article about the CMAX Idea

Getting Agencies to Buy into the CreditMax Plan

To gain the cooperation of the collection agencies in this area CreditMax offered the agencies a lucrative fee structure that compensates both the agency and the individual collector far above and beyond industry standards. Historically an above average collector earns around $50,000 per year where the top CreditMax collector can earn over $350,000 per year. The CreditMax collection model is unique in that CreditMax does not only pay the agency owner, but also compensates the individual collector.

Creation of the CreditMax Debt Sales System (DSS)

Once the CreditMax Collection Network began to operate Mr. Kass and Mr. Bernstein turned their attention to the resale of the assets at the end of the collection cycle. To maximize the resale value of assets Mr. Kass and Mr. Bernstein began planning the CreditMax Debt Sales System (DSS). The DSS is a revolutionary online debt trading platform that allows debt buyers and sellers to trade portfolios of any size including individual accounts. By selling accounts individually rather than in blocks, debt buyers are able to purchase only those accounts that meet their collection criteria. For the first time in the history of the debt collection industry debt buyers can customize the portfolios they purchase enabling them to achieve maximum liquidation rates.

Click Here to Read More about the Value of Selling Individual Accounts

CreditMax DSS National Launch

On May 14th, 2006 when the CreditMax DSS launched its first national sale, $24,000,000 of debt sold in just 7 1/2 minutes. The success and speed of the sale illustrated how this new technology was quickly accepted by the debt buyers around the country. Within a few months of the DSS national launch, over 1,000 debt buyers had already registered to buy debt on CreditMax’s Debt Sales System.

After witnessing the success CreditMax was experiencing in individual account sales, other debt sellers started to request that CreditMax also sell their debt through DSS. Offering this service for no charge helped to get more debt sellers involved in selling debt through DSS which in turn brought more buyers because of the availability of customizable inventory.

CreditMax Experiences Rapid Growth

Throughout 2006 and into 2007 CreditMax continued to expand their extensive debt buyer network to include over 4,000 registered and approved debt buyers around the world. During this same time CreditMax recruited, hired and trained the industry’s largest debt sales and business development teams. The Business Development Team worked with debt issuers and sellers to bring new debt onto the system for sale. The Sales Team continued to expand the marketplace and introduce buyers to the products available through DSS.

At the end of 2007 CreditMax decided to re-brand the organization and the technology. The name CreditMax was shortened to CMAX and the Debt Sales System or DSS became known simply as the NDSE. This re-branding was reflected in all of our advertisements, marketing materials and even caused a complete remaking of the CreditMax website. The new website was launched on January 20th, 2009.