Money Lender · Tsim Sha Tsui East · Incorporated 2013

A tangent touches
the circle at one point.
A flat rate touches
the truth about the same.

Tangent Asia Pacific Finance Limited lends from Granville Road in Tsim Sha Tsui East. Ask any lender in this city for a rate and you will often be told a small monthly number. That number is not the cost of your loan, and the difference between it and the real figure is the most expensive misunderstanding in Hong Kong consumer credit.

2013

Incorporated in Hong Kong
as a private company

60%

Statutory ceiling on the
effective annual rate

Cap. 163

Money Lenders Ordinance,
the law we operate under

Intermediaries appointed
to collect fees from you

The arithmetic

The same loan, two numbers

A flat rate is applied to the whole sum you borrowed, for the whole term — including the part you have already paid back. An effective rate reflects what you actually still owe as the months go by. They describe the same loan and they are not close to each other.

Approximate conversion, 12-month instalment loan — illustration only
If you are quoted	What it means over twelve months	Effective annual rate
0.5% monthly flat	Sounds like six per cent a year	≈ 11%
1% monthly flat	Sounds like twelve per cent a year	≈ 22%
1.5% monthly flat	Sounds like eighteen per cent a year	≈ 33%
2% monthly flat	Sounds like twenty-four per cent a year	≈ 44%
2.5% monthly flat	Sounds like thirty per cent a year	≈ 55%

Roughly speaking, on a one-year instalment loan the effective rate is about double the flat rate. Nobody is doing anything unlawful by quoting the flat figure — but you cannot compare two offers unless both are expressed the same way. Ask every lender, including us, for the effective annual rate calculated on the basis the Money Lenders Ordinance specifies, together with the total amount you will repay. Two numbers, no arguing.

What we lend against

Every facility has a stated amount, a stated term and a written schedule. We publish no rates, because any figure here would be wrong for almost everyone reading it.

Personal instalment loans

A fixed sum over a fixed term. You know the final payment date on the day you sign it, and the effective rate is on the agreement rather than mentioned in conversation.

Debt consolidation

Folding several obligations into one schedule — but only where the total cost genuinely falls once every fee is counted. Where it does not, we will show you why and decline the business.

III

SME and commercial facilities

Working capital sized against what the trade can service through a poor quarter, not what it earned in a good one. A facility that only works at peak revenue is a problem being scheduled.

Property-secured lending

Loans secured on Hong Kong property. Security is not a formality: the asset is genuinely at risk if the arrangement fails, and we say so here rather than in a clause near the end.

Short-term bridging

Cover for a defined gap with an identified source of repayment. Where the exit is uncertain, bridging finance does not solve the problem — it enlarges it and adds a deadline.

Four protections you already have

Hong Kong's framework contains real safeguards that most borrowers never use, largely because nobody tells them the safeguards exist. They apply to us exactly as to anyone else.

The register is public and free

The Companies Registry maintains the register of licensed money lenders, searchable through its e-Services portal, with lists of current licensees available at no charge. Look up any lender before you deal with them, and check the name matches the entity exactly. A licence number printed in an advertisement proves nothing on its own.

There is a ceiling, set by law

Lending at an effective rate above 60% per annum is prohibited under the Money Lenders Ordinance, and the effective rate must be calculated by the method the Ordinance sets rather than one a lender picks. A ceiling is not a recommendation — an offer can be entirely lawful and still be unaffordable for you.

You should not be paying an agent

The warning carried on every money lender's advertisement in Hong Kong exists because unlicensed "arrangers" collecting handling fees are the most common way borrowers here lose money. We appoint nobody to solicit you or to take a fee. If a person stands between you and this company, they were not sent by us.

The agreement belongs in writing

Amount, effective rate, schedule and total repayable go in a written agreement of which you keep a copy. Never sign a document containing blanks, never sign one you have not read to the end, and treat any promise made only aloud as one that does not exist. A lender who resists any of this has answered your question about them.

Questions, answered at length

Why won't you publish an interest rate?

Because it would be wrong for nearly everyone who read it. The rate on any particular facility depends on the amount, the term, the security and the assessment, and a headline figure on a website is a marketing device rather than information. What we will commit to is the form of the answer: the effective annual rate on the statutory basis, the total amount repayable and the full schedule, in writing, before you sign anything. Hold every competing offer to that same standard and the comparison becomes trivial.

II.

Is a flat rate a trick?

Not in itself, and it is widely used. The difficulty is that a flat rate is applied to the original sum for the entire term, including the portion you have already repaid — so on a one-year instalment loan it understates the real cost by roughly half. A borrower comparing one lender's flat rate against another's effective rate is not comparing anything at all. Ask both to restate in effective terms; a lender who will not is telling you something.

III.

Should I borrow to repay other borrowing?

Only where the total cost falls, and you should insist on seeing that demonstrated rather than asserted. Consolidation genuinely helps when several expensive obligations become one cheaper schedule. It harms when it lengthens the term, adds fees and frees up limits that then get used again. If you are borrowing to make payments on existing loans, more credit is not the answer to the question you are actually facing, and we would rather say that than write the business.

IV.

Someone contacted me offering a loan from you.

Treat it as false until verified by contacting us directly on the number and address published on this page. We do not appoint agents to solicit borrowers, and nobody acting for this company will request a payment of any kind before a loan is advanced. If money has already been sent to such a person, report it to the police — and do not send more in the hope of recovering it, which is how the second and larger loss usually happens.

Should I try a bank first?

Usually, yes, and we will say so if you ask. Bank credit is generally cheaper, and where a bank will lend what you need on a workable timetable that is the better deal. Money lenders earn their place where the amount is modest, the timing is short, or the application is sound but does not fit a bank's criteria. Anyone in this trade who tells you never to try a bank is protecting their own margin.

VI.

What if I cannot make a payment?

Tell us before the payment is missed rather than after. The options available while an account is still current are considerably wider, and avoiding the conversation is precisely what turns a difficult month into something much worse. Where a loan is secured on property, that property is genuinely at risk if the arrangement fails — which is why we would rather lend less at the start than restructure later. If any lender responds to arrears with threats or harassment, that is a matter for the police, whoever the money came from.

A tangent touchesthe circle at one point.A flat rate touchesthe truth about the same.