Impaired debt buyer Pioneer Credit has raised A$5.8 million of equity capital, which the company will use to acquire consumer debt. The company outlaid $23.2 million on debt purchases in the December half and has $117 million of loans under payment arrangements. It made a net profit of $3.3 million in the December half. HSBC Bank Australia has appointed Hamish Kelly as head of global banking, Australia. Kelly will be in charge of the bank's corporate, multinational, financial and government clients. He has been head of the bank's financial institutions business since 2013 - a position he retains. ANZ said its BlueNotes title has "5000 external newsletter subscribers", two years after the bank's debut in business publishing. Paul Edwards, group general manager communications at the bank, wrote in an article yesterday at BlueNotes that "there have been 500,000 unique views of BlueNotes and this is now averaging around 65,000 a month. Social media accounts for 20 per cent of traffic with over 6000 Twitter followers." Kevin Davern, former joint national secretary of the Finance Sector Union, passed away last week after a long illness, aged 73. In an obituary on the FSU website, the union recorded that Davern, the former federal secretary of the Australian Insurance Employees Union was "one of the driving forces behind the formation of the FSU in the 1980s and 1990s." The FSU formed in 1991 when five separate unions, including the banking union, joined forces to become one. ASX-hopeful Fastacash could be worth 4.5-times to 5.5-times revenue, according to sponsor broker Wilson HTM, which valued the company at up to AS$140 million, the AFR's Street Talk reports. The fast growing Fastacash is meeting potential investors in Asia this week, Street Talk understands. Fastacash has told potential investors it is seeking to raise $50 million, which would allow it to buy two European payments businesses. Three entrepreneurs - including two ex-Macquarie bankers - have found a profitable niche in the sharing economy, after starting off bundling vehicle finance and specialised insurance packages for aspiring Uber drivers, the AFR reports. Their new policies combine standard comprehensive insurance with a ridesharing add-on, which costs two to three times the private vehicle rate but a fraction of the cost to insure a full time licensed taxicab. They have subsequently spotted openings in other fields of unmet demand for credit, such as financing utilities and tools for newly qualified apprentices and contractors who lack a credit record. Australia's initial public offerings outperformed the blue chips in 2015 and in 2016 the trend continues, with returns from new listings on the ASX lifting 1.3 per cent over the first quarter, compared to the S&P/ASX 200, which dropped 5.4 per cent. "Of the 13 IPOs on the ASX during the first quarter [of 2016], first-day returns averaged 9.2 per cent," said Ben Bucknell, CEO of OnMarket Bookbuild, an application aimed at giving retail investors "free and fair access" to IPOs. The average shareholder return of the 93 companies that listed