My buddy's LLC has 6 employees, a warehouse, and $340,000 in revenue ...None of that is real The LLC exists. It's registered with the state. Has an EIN. Has a business checking account at Chase with $1,000 in it The 6 employees? That's what he typed on the Amex application under "number of employees." Amex didn't call them. Because they don't exist The warehouse? That's the "business address" he listed. It's a virtual office he rents for $49/month that gives him a real street address and mail forwarding The $340,000 in revenue? That's "projected annual revenue" for a business that has produced exactly $0 since he formed it 3 weeks ago Chase gave him $55,000 Amex gave him $75,000 Capital One gave him $40,000 US Bank gave him $25,000 $195,000 total. All at 0% APR. For a business that has never made a single dollar "That's fraud" No. Putting KNOWINGLY FALSE information on a credit application is fraud under 18 U.S.C. § 1014. But "projected revenue" is a real thing every startup reports. Every YC company projecting $10M ARR on day 1 is doing the same math. The difference is they project it to VCs and give up 20% equity. He projected it to Chase and gave up 0% The banks primarily approve based on your PERSONAL credit score for business card applications. The revenue field and employee count are secondary signals that get minimal verification on most standard business card apps His personal score: 728. Normal. Average That 728 score on a personal card application would get him $8K-$12K at 22% APR That same 728 on business card applications got him $195K at 0% APR Same human. Same credit. Same brain. Different product. Different counter at the same bank Here's the part that makes finance bros lose their minds: Business cards don't report balances to personal credit bureaus. He can carry $195K across 4 business cards and his personal credit report shows basically $0 in debt. Utilization at 2%. Score stays at 728 He went and got a personal mortgage 2 months later. The mortgage lender saw a clean borrower with almost no debt. Approved at 6.2% $195K in business debt. Invisible to the mortgage lender. Two separate credit profiles for the same person. Both legal He used $80K to actually start the business (marketing agency). Revenue hit $27K/month by month 4. Paid every card off from cash flow. Still has all the credit lines open for round 2 The "projected $340,000 in revenue" is looking pretty accurate now actually lmao (we build the full entity + credit stack. if your personal score needs work first, we fix that in 30-90 days... then we build the LLC and run the funding sequence. $100K-$250K at 0%. link in bio)
