With the LendIt Europe taking place this week many companies have chosen to make some big announcements. Yesterday, we featured...
A common question in the marketplace lending industry is what needs to happen for the industry to really hit its...
Ohpen, which provides banking technology services, is partnering with insurance giant Aegon; Aegon plans to replace standalone systems for pensions, savings, current accounts and wealth management with the new platform; Ohpen's technology runs on AWS and Aegon will plugin via the API-based interface; Chris Zadeh, Ohpen's CEO stated: "If you want to be ready for the future and save an enormous amount of code, you should have one administrative system for all these different brands. Aegon and Knab and their pensions will use the same cloud-based administrative system, and that's ours." Source
UK small business lender Funding Circle formed a strategic partnership with the Dutch financial services firm Aegon; Aegon will look to fund about $205 million worth of loans in the first twelve months and then steadily increase that amount for the next three years; the deal helps to ease the gap left by the European Investment Bank who pulled back a $129 million commitment in the wake of the Brexit vote; Funding Circle CEO and Co-Founder Samir Desai explained to AltFi: "This partnership is validation of the attractive risk-adjusted returns that are being generated to investors by lending through Funding Circle. We hope our joint programme with Aegon will develop to deliver increased lending to UK small businesses over the coming years." Source
Aegon has announced it will allocate 1.5 billion euros ($1.6 billion) of its investment portfolio to Auxmoney P2P loans; the platform offers average returns of 5.5%; the investment represents one of the market's largest institutional endorsements in P2P loans; Aegon is also involved in a 15 million euro ($16.03 million) Series E funding round for Auxmoney. Source
Marketplace loans are becoming more integrated into institutional portfolios however institutional investors are still only beginning to take interest in marketplace lending investment allocations; in Europe, Aegon has made a significant institutional investment in marketplace loans from Auxmoney; the investment demonstrates that institutions such as insurance companies are getting comfortable with the asset class; it could also cause increased investment in P2P loans in Europe specifically where fixed income yields are historically low. Source
With worldwide rates continuing to stay low investors continue to look at alternative fixed income assets to earn larger returns....