Qwil’s Johnny Reinsch: ‘Our mission is to provide liquidity to SMBs and freelancers around the world’ Nationwide Announces New Partnership...
Back in 2005 Zopa quietly launched their P2P lending platform in the UK, the world’s first. It was the start...
UK based Zopa has warned investors that defaults on high risk loans are rising; Zopa increased originations to high risk borrowers in 2016 and introduced their Zopa Core and Zopa Plus Products; the company originally expected default rates for 2016 at 4.14 percent but have revised that number to 4.93 percent; they also raised their estimates for 2017 loans to these borrowers to be 4.86 percent from 4.52 percent. Source.
Augmentum Capital, venture group backed by Lord Rothschild, is looking to raise more than $175mn for a closed end fund to invest in fintech startups; the company plans to take positions in p2p lending platform Zopa and crowdfunding platform Seedrs, both of whom are in the UK; “There are very few places you can go to right now to invest in fintech at the moment on the public markets,” said George O’Connor, analyst at Stifel, to the FT. “So [this] taps into the zeitgeist.” Source.
Some of Europes largest online lenders have started to grapple with the idea of potentially becoming a bank; Funding Circle says it has no plans to do so, Zopa on the other hand says they are becoming a bank; other online lenders like YOUnited Credit in France and Raize in Portugal have thought about becoming a bank but thus far see the flexibility of not being a bank as an advantage; the banking market overall is going through quite the change and the definition of a bank is sure to be examined. Source.
The Financial Times has released their annual ranking of the fastest growing companies in Europe; the list features some household...
Bitcoin Exchanges Try to Lure High-Speed Traders like Virtu and Citadel Zopa to boost regulatory clout ahead of Brexit PBoC...
UK based Arrowgrass will offer investors fintech exposure through a new vehicle listed on the AIM Market; the $97mn IPO named TruFin, is the first time investors will have access to one of the country’s p2p platforms in Zopa; “Listing on AIM will allow us to provide further capital to our subsidiaries and scale faster, and take advantage of any developments in the current financial services market,” said Henry Kenner, chief executive officer of TruFin plc, to AltFi. Source.
Early last year UK online lender Zopa closed the platform to new investors, they have now re-opened it; investors will be able to invest in both the Core and Plus products, with and without the IFISA; last week Zopa also announced for the first time since 2015 they were raising target investor rates to 4 percent for Core and 4.6 percent for Plus. Source.
The latest securitization of Zopa loans priced tighter than last year’s; it was led by P2PGI and arranged by Deutsche Bank; the senior tranche was rated AA by Moody’s; Jaidev Janardana, Zopa’s CEO stated, “This is a further demonstration of investor and market confidence in our origination and underwriting capabilities. Our ability to originate high quality loans continues to make the Zopa investment asset a distinctive and attractive one to retail and institutional investors alike.” Source