During the week I share the latest marketplace lending news on Twitter as it happens. Then every Saturday I take the most interesting news items and blog posts from the past week and share them here.
Investors have become skeptical about online lending since early pioneers flamed out from CNBC – All online lending CEOs know that the easy money is long gone but this article has numbers confirming this.
Fintech student lending platform raises $240m from AltFi – Another big funding round closed, this one by Prodigy Finance, a $40M Series C and $200M debt facility.
Weekly Industry Update: Regulatory Clarity in Sight for Madden V. Midland; Q2 Earnings Season Highlights from PeerIQ – Interesting look at the numbers comparing banks, non-banks and credit card lenders.
Tech Banks: Will Fintech Dethrone Traditional Banking? from deBanked – Great piece profiling several small to midsize banks who have become leaders in fintech.
‘You don’t just build a bank overnight’: Digital start-up Starling taking financial services by storm from CNBC – In the UK Starling Bank is one of the leading digital banks. CNBC has this profile of their founder and CEO.
Wal-Mart Nears a Pilot Deal to Offer Customers Installment Loans from The Wall Street Journal – This is huge. Affirm is near an agreement with Walmart to pilot a POS loan product for purchases over $200.
Keep CRA for fintech, but lose its geographic boundaries from American Banker – Most people agree the Community Reinvestment Act needs to be reformed. Here are some ideas on how to do it.
Zopa scales back higher-risk lending due to UK consumer credit outlook from Peer2Peer Finance News – In the UK Zopa is adjusting their lending standards as they see a worsening credit outlook.
Leading marketplace lending platform Funding Circle withdraws manual bidding process from AltFi – Since launch Funding Circle UK has allowed manual bidding for investors. They are now stopping this.
A call for more considered critiques of P2P lending from AltFi – There has been some bad press in the UK about p2p lending. Ryan Weeks gives his perspective on all this.
Wells Fargo, U.S. Bancorp Turn to Startup to Speed Up Mortgage Applications from The Wall Street Journal – The mortgage loan application process at big banks is broken. Enter Blend with some new marquis clients.
Early-Stage Fintech Investment In The UK & Germany Goes To Insurtech, Banking from CB Insights – Where the investment money is going for European fintech deals.
Ethereum-Based Invoice Finance Platform Hive Raises Over US$8 Million from CoinJournal – This is an interesting one. The Hive Project is an Ethereum-based invoice finance platform that just raised almost $9M.
Klarna is reportedly partnering with online payment giant Stripe to fuel US expansion from Business Insider – Another interesting fintech partnership. Stripe will soon begin offering installment loans through Klarna.
AutoFi Raises $10 Million Series A To Make It Easier To Get A Car Loan from Forbes – Former PitchIt @ LendIt winner AutoFi has closed a significant round of funding.
LendingClub Hit with Lawsuit from Crowdfund Insider – Another lawsuit has been filed against Lending Club targeting the board and the former CEO and CFO.
From the Lend Academy Forum
The Lend Academy forum is where investors go to discuss p2p lending. Below are some topics that were being discussed this week.
Best way to measure true return? – Understanding how to calculate returns is important for new retail investors.
Borrower Fraud – Investors discuss “straight rollers” who are individuals that take out a loan with no intention of repaying it.
5 Key Things to Know About Investing at LendingClub – Forum members discuss the future of retail investors and interest rates on Lending Club’s platform.
Peter Renton is the chairman and co-founder of LendIt Fintech, the world’s first and largest digital media and events company focused on fintech. Peter has been writing about fintech since 2010 and he is the author and creator of the Fintech One-on-One Podcast, the first and longest-running fintech interview series. Peter has been interviewed by the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, The New York Times, CNBC, CNN, Fortune, NPR, Fox Business News, the Financial Times, and dozens of other publications.