Peter Renton of Lend Academy shares his quarterly marketplace lending results for the third quarter; portfolio includes twelve accounts with investments in Lending Club, Prosper, Direct Lending Income Fund, Lend Academy P2P Fund, P2Pinvestor and PeerStreet; Q3 reported another quarter of lower returns; third quarter trailing twelve month return was 8.21%, a decrease from 8.72% in the second quarter and the sixth consecutive quarter of lower portfolio return. Source
Diwakar Choubey of MoneyLion speaks with Lend Academy in their last podcast of 2016; MoneyLion is an online lender also offering a financial wellness app; firm has received significant funding in 2016; MoneyLion launched in 2014 with an initial focus on a data decision services platform which later evolved into a full service lending platform; firm currently functions as a balance sheet lender but plans to expand to a hybrid approach in 2017. Source
Lend Academy recently highlighted the trends in interest rates at Lending Club in their recent article; Lending Club has changed interest rates five times since late 2015; the recent trend of increasing rates can be seen in the below chart taken from Lending Club's statistics page which tracks average interest rates across loan grades since 2008; higher risk loans have seen the most impact from recent changes in interest rates. Source
Securitization has become increasingly utilized by marketplace lending platforms and in 2016 a record number of deals were done; Lend Academy provides details on securitization structuring, Lending Club's recent securitization and the importance of transparency in their article; in Lending Club's December securitization the total amount of loans in the portfolio was approximately $131.3 million and the portfolio was rated by Kroll Bond Rating Agency. Source
A member of the Lend Academy forum has created a table sharing the annualized rate of return on 36 month loans based on differing charge off scenarios; the table outlines when returns will become negative at varying interest rates which can in turn be compared to interest rates on loans issued by Lending Club; the findings are valuable to investors who are interested in knowing what might happen to their portfolio if defaults were to increase. Source
Lend Academy provides 2017 predictions for the industry and analyzes last year's predictions in their article; predictions for 2016 that did occur included a new auto lending product at Lending Club, online lending platform launches from banks, an increased focus on retail investors and a new industry trade association; in 2017 predictions include at least a dozen new bank partnerships, positive reception for the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency's fintech charter, lending platforms offering banking products, increased use of artificial intelligence and significant foreign investment from China in US platforms. Source
Lend Academy provides insight on online lending performance trends in their article; details interest rate changes and trends from 2010 to present; from 2010 to 2014 returns were relatively stable; in 2015, Lending Club interest rates increased with the Fed's first rate increase in many years however the rate increases were primarily focused on the higher risk loans; capital market investors began slowing investment in 2015 and reduced investments even further after the resignation of Lending Club CEO Renaud Laplanche in May 2016; interest rates at Lending Club have been gradually rising since late 2015, specifically in the higher risk loans; rate increases were put in place to help to offset some degradation in performance; Lend Academy will explore recent vintage performance in part two. Source
Small Business Administration (SBA) loans are a popular source of funding for small businesses in the US; SmartBiz Loans is one of the online market's leading providers of these loans; Lend Academy talks with Evan Singer, CEO of SmartBiz, in their podcast; SmartBiz recently became the number one provider of SBA loans under $350,000, beating out big banks such as Wells Fargo for smaller dollar loans; Evan Singer talks about the firm's business and the origination process which involves a network of bank lenders. Source
ApplePie Capital has built a dynamic marketplace lending platform with a range of high net worth and institutional investors focused on business lending for franchises; Lend Academy talks with ApplePie Capital CEO Denise Thomas in their podcast; the podcast provides in-depth details on platform loan terms for franchisees; Denise Thomas also gives insight into the small business franchise market and talks about recent capital investments for the platform. Source