The West Australian based ASX-listed Goldfields Money (GMY) issued a trading update yesterday, which doubled as a progress report on its merger with unlisted mortgage aggregator Finsure. The statement comes a few weeks ahead of Goldfields Money's 2017/18 half-year report. The regional ADI is making use of its ASX listing and banking licence, intending to take over 100 per cent of Finsure by issuing 40.75 million GMY shares to Finsure at an implied price of A$1.50 per share. This values the aggregator's equity at A$61 million and, if the agreement goes ahead, the two parties will combine to create a national mortgage business with a digital retail banking capacity. Goldfields - keen to proceed after rebuffing a takeover bid from FirstMac - said it experienced strong growth during the six months ended 31 December 2017, with loan settlements for the period of approximately $24 million, the largest half-year results recorded by the company. As at 31 December 2017 Goldfields Money's total loan book had grown to around $201 million (compared to $183 million at 30 June 2017). Notwithstanding one-off costs incurred in responding to a Firstmac takeover offer, which valued Goldfields at $25 million, the company said it expected to report a profit for the half-year ended 31 December 2017, a turnaround from pre-tax losses of $217,000 and $1.34 million, in the 2015/16 and 2016/17 years, respectively.One-off costs have played a part in Goldfields' growth plans in previous years as well. In the past two financial years, according to the company's annual reports, pre-tax losses were racked up through paying out the previous management team, and paying up for a new core banking system from Temenos (after it took over local fintech Rubik Financial).In assessing the deal's progress towards its intended destiny of a scrip funded merger with Finsure, via a statement to the ASX, Goldfields said "several conditions precedent" to the proposed deal have been met in recent times:•    On 31 January 2018, Finsure completed the acquisition of wholesale mortgage manager Nationalcorp Home Loans, which manages a white-labelled loan book with a current balance of around $725 million. The acquisition increased the size of Finsure's wholesale portfolio to $2.2 billion and total historical book to $30.6 billion. NHL is expected to add about $1.2 million of current run-rate cash EBITDA (excluding the net present value of future trail income) to Finsure on a pro-forma consolidated basis. •    In satisfaction of another condition, Bendigo and Adelaide Bank, which has funded a $26 million off-balance sheet loan facility for GMY, has given its consent for the transaction to proceed. In its own trading update for the six months ended 31 December 2017 Finsure said its total loan book (prior to the NHL acquisition) grew to about $30 billion; record loan settlements were generated ($6.3 billion compared to the previous record half of $5.9 billion in the previous comparable period); and its broker network grew to 1,370 loan writers. Goldfields Money and Finsure said they would continue to work towards satisfaction of