Marketplace Lending News Roundup – June 17

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.

Peer-to-peer comes of age as alternative asset class for investors from Financial Times – In the UK most of the major p2p lending platforms have obtained regulatory approval now.

CommonBond Closes $231 Million Securitization of Student Loans from Crowdfund Insider – Another week another oversubscribed marketplace lending securitization. This one a $231M deal from CommonBond.

What do the most up-to-date numbers in marketplace lending tell us? from AltFi – Interesting insights into Prosper and the big 3 UK platforms from AltFi Data.

Why Banks Are Going To Survive from Forbes – Good piece on fintech-bank partnerships featuring “platformification” by LendKey, SigFig and Avant.

Biggest Online Lenders Don’t Always Check Key Borrower Data from Bloomberg – Nothing really new here but a pretty negative article about marketplace lending by Matt Scully.

Online Lenders are doing a good job of identifying the frauds (even without hard income verification) from Croudify – Good response by Croudify to the Bloomberg article. Non-verified loans actually perform better.

When fintech meets CRA: SoFi bank bid draws activists’ ire from American Banker – Now that SoFi’s bank application is public many people are weighing in with opinions.

Mobile-first, but not digital-only: Why the bank of the future may still center around people from Tearsheet – Interesting ideas on why branch banking may still be important in the mobile banking age.

Ranger Direct Lending fund updates on loan write-off from AltFi – UK listed fund Ranger Direct Lending is being hit by its investment in now defunct Argon Credit.

Beijing’s unease over online lending puts Lufax listing in limbo from Financial Times – Chinese internet finance giant Lufax is delaying its long anticipated IPO until at least Q1 2018.

A finance startup backed by Mark Cuban just won a share of $3 million from Business Insider – The Financial Solutions Lab has awarded winners of their $3M competition, includes PitchIt @ LendIt winner Nova.

Scott Sanborn Discusses the Future: On Demand Credit from Lending Club – Scott Sanborn, LendingClub CEO, does a Q & A on the future of lending.

Managing Customer Acquisition Costs in Online Lending from Lending Times – Good profile of MoneyLion, a company that offers personal financial management tools first and loans second.

Zopa launches IFISA with charge-free July offer from P2P Finance News – Zopa becomes the first of the big three in the UK to launch their Innovative Finance ISA.

A Kadinsky-esque picture: the evolution of Risk to Reward on Lending Club from LendingRobot – Comparing interest rates to default rates over time at Lending Club.

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.

Lending Club Results – Negative Returns – Investors share their thoughts on investing in Lending Club and exploring other options.

I made a big mistake – An investor asks how to avoid custodian fees with a small Prosper IRA account.

Consumer Distress – Forum members discuss several articles that talk about the state of the American consumer.