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My Quarterly Marketplace Lending Results – Q2 2019

My latest quarterly investment results show an overall 6.20% return for the year ending June 30, 2019

October 8, 2019 By Peter Renton 7 Comments

Views: 1,052

Time for an update on my quarterly investment returns. This is something I have been doing for many years now and I know it is appreciated by many of you. I started out reporting on my marketplace lending investments in Q4 2011 and have provided updates every quarter since then. I share all the details of my LendingClub and Prosper investments as well several other investments I have made in the online lending space.

Overall Marketplace Lending Return at 6.20%*

The upward trend in my returns continued in Q2, making it the fifth quarter in a row with increasing returns. My preliminary return for the 12 months ending June 30, 2019 is 6.20% (one investment is still not final), the best I have achieved since Q3 2017.

My six original accounts at LendingClub and Prosper have all been open for at least seven years so they are very mature accounts that have experienced several turns of capital as I have kept reinvesting over the years. I have separated these out because these were the accounts I had when I first started doing these reports so readers can go back and see how they have trended over time. But as I have said before I am liquidating my taxable accounts here and will focus my investments in consumers loans in my retirement accounts.

Underwriting changes that were made in 2017 continue to bear fruit for my personal loan investments. My six original accounts had a return of 5.48%, a vast improvement from the 2.34% return of just a year ago, and back to near where it should be. In today’s benign credit environment I would still like to see returns in the 6-7% range for personal loans and we are headed in that direction.

Now on to the numbers. Click the table below to see it at full size.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Peer to Peer Lending Tagged With: Lending Club, Prosper, Quarterly Results, ROI, XIRR

Views: 1,052

My Quarterly Marketplace Lending Results – Q1 2019

My latest quarterly investment results show an overall 6.09% return for the year ending March 31, 2019

July 24, 2019 By Peter Renton 2 Comments

Views: 1,248

Put this in the “better late than never” department. Yes, I know it is late July and I am only now just publishing my Q1 2019 returns. Thanks to those of you who reached out but rest assured I am still committed to sharing my results publicly and I apologize for the extreme tardiness of this update.

I am happy to report this quarter that my returns continue to improve. Since hitting bottom in Q2 of 2018 my returns have improved each quarter. Both LendingClub and Prosper showed their best returns in almost two years as the underwriting changes that were implemented in 2017 have had a positive impact.

Overall Marketplace Lending Return at 6.09%

My overall returns for the twelve months ending March 31, 2019 was 6.09%. This is up from 5.35% that I reported in Q4 and 4.77% in Q3. My original six LendingClub and Prosper accounts had another full percentage point jump. Last quarter I reported the returns on those six accounts had jumped from 3.19% in Q3 to 4.16% in Q4. We see this quarter they are at 5.18%. This is quite a remarkable turnaround and while I still think 5% is not a high enough return for unsecured consumer lending, it is certainly moving in the right direction.

One point to note is that I am liquidating my taxable accounts at LendingClub and Prosper. I have a little too much exposure to consumer credit in my overall portfolio and so I will be focused only on investing in my IRA accounts there. I am moving my redeemed cash into other marketplace lending accounts as well as other investments outside of fintech.

Now on to the numbers. Click the table below to see it at full size.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Peer to Peer Lending Tagged With: AlphaFlow, Fundrise, Lending Club, Money360, P2Binvestor, PeerStreet, Prosper, Quarterly Results, ROI, StreetShares, XIRR, Yieldstreet

Views: 1,248

My Quarterly Marketplace Lending Results – Q2 2018

My latest quarterly investment results show an overall 4.46% return for the year ending June 30, 2018

September 25, 2018 By Peter Renton 12 Comments

Views: 2,035

I know I am very late with my update this quarter as many of you have pointed out in emails and comments. But rest assured I am still committed to sharing my results publicly and I apologize for the tardiness of this update.

I wish I had good news to share but alas the decline in my marketplace lending returns has continued unabated. The biggest culprit for my declining returns is my exposure to unsecured consumer credit. As I have written about many times in the past a decline in underwriting standards at the major consumer lending platforms in 2015 and 2016 led to a marked increase in defaults where returns for individual investors like myself were significantly below projections. Recent vintages indicate that this severe decline is being reversed but given the loans I am invested in are three and five years in duration the effects are still being felt inside my own portfolio and will be for some time.

Overall Marketplace Lending Return at 4.46%

In my report from one year ago my trailing twelve month (TTM) return stood at 7.28% and I wondered whether my returns were in a downward spiral. That has proven to be the case as I am down almost three full percentage points over the last year as my TTM returns as of June 30 stood at 4.46%.

About 18 months ago I moved to a more conservative approach in my investing, focusing primarily on the lower risk loans at Lending Club and Prosper. The average interest rate of my portfolios continues to drop steadily every quarter but given my sizable portfolios of thousands of loans it takes a while for these changes to fully take effect. Interestingly, the one account where I have taken a more conservative approach from day one, my Prosper New Roth IRA, is easily my best performing consumer lending account with a TTM return of 6.32%.

Now on to the numbers. Click the table below to see it at full size.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Peer to Peer Lending Tagged With: Lending Club, Prosper, Quarterly Results, XIRR

Views: 2,035

My Quarterly Marketplace Lending Results – Q1 2018

My latest quarterly investment results show an overall 4.90% return for the year ending March 31, 2018

May 24, 2018 By Peter Renton 32 Comments

Views: 1,720

It is that time again when I share my quarterly investment returns. This is something I have been doing for many years now and I know it is one of the most popular features on Lend Academy. I started out investing in marketplace lending many years ago with just Lending Club and Prosper but slowly have added new investments over the years. I share all the details in this post.

Before I get started I do need to provide one caveat with this quarter’s returns. I do not have final numbers for our own Lend Academy P2P fund yet. We are reviewing valuation methodologies and we have several service providers working with us on that possible change. This process is taking quite a bit longer than we expected. I know my quarterly returns are keenly anticipated by many of you and I like to publish them around this time. So rather than wait until the valuation is final I decided to publish my quarterly report now and I will adjust when we get final numbers. In the meantime I have used the December 31 numbers, assuming a flat Q1, to provide a returns estimate.

I have one new addition this quarter, Fundrise, they are a real estate platform that is open to non-accredited investors. While I had invested a very small amount with them several years ago I added to it substantially last year and so I am including it in my returns update now. You can find out more by listening to my podcast with the CEO, Ben Miller, from last year.

Overall Marketplace Lending Return at 4.90%

After a downward trend that has continued for many years I am wondering when I will reach a bottom. My preliminary return of 4.70% is close to where it was last quarter but still down. I don’t expect my final Lend Academy P2P Fund return to increase this number so I am still stuck in the downward trend of returns.

My six original accounts at Lending Club and Prosper have all been open for at least six years so they are very mature accounts that have experienced several turns of capital as I have kept reinvesting over the years. I separate these out because these were the accounts I had when I first started doing these reports so readers can go back and see how they have trended over time. The returns for the past year are still bad at 2.34% as I continue to pay for poor underwriting performance in 2015 and 2016 at both companies. When you see today that you can get 3% on a 10-year Treasury Note a sub 3% return is just not acceptable for an unsecured consumer loan.

While I continue to reinvest the principal and interest earned in my LendingClub and Prosper accounts in the hope and expectation of a rebound I am committing new capital elsewhere. I like real estate where you can still get mid to high single digit returns with the added security of an asset backing the loan. That is why I have added new money in the last 12 months to companies like Peerstreet, Alphaflow, Money360 and Fundrise. All are detailed here.

Now on to the numbers. Click the table below to see it at full size.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Peer to Peer Lending Tagged With: Lending Club, Prosper, Quarterly Results, ROI, XIRR

Views: 1,720

My Quarterly Marketplace Lending Results – Q4 2017

My latest quarterly investment results show an overall 5.01% return for the 2017 calendar year

February 22, 2018 By Peter Renton 35 Comments

Views: 397

Time for my regular quarterly returns post, one of the most popular features here on Lend Academy. I have been sharing my detailed quarterly returns with readers since 2011 and I will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. I know investors are most interested in returns, in particular how they have been trending over time. You can go back and look at the breakdown of my investments every quarter for the past six years.

If you do look at my historic returns you will see they have been moving steadily in a downward trajectory since the beginning of 2014 when my trailing twelve month (TTM) return was 12.44%. I look back on those returns wistfully now, when my accounts were firing on all cylinders and in reality we were being overly rewarded for the risk we were taking. Today, the pendulum has swung too far the other way and I think the return is too low for the risk.

Overall Marketplace Lending Return at 5.01%

The long decline in my returns has continued with 2017 by far my worst year since I began investing with LendingClub back in 2009. My overall TTM return  in Q4 2017 was 5.01% compared to 6.64% in Q3 2017 and 8.07% one year ago.

I used to proudly say I had never had a down month in my LendingClub or Prosper investments. Now, I have not just had down months but down quarters as well. And I came perilously close to having a down year in my main LendingClub with my return coming in at 0.01%.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Peer to Peer Lending Tagged With: Lending Club, Prosper, Quarterly Results, ROI, XIRR

Views: 397

My Quarterly Marketplace Lending Results – Q2 2017

My latest quarterly investment results show an overall 7.28% return for the year ending June 30, 2017

August 21, 2017 By Peter Renton 28 Comments

Views: 664

Every quarter around this time I get emails from readers asking when I will be publishing my quarterly returns post. For many years now it has been one of the most popular features on Lend Academy. People like to know how others are doing so I have been sharing my returns here every quarter since Q4 2011. Over the years I have diversified beyond my initial investments in Lending Club and Prosper into the three major asset classes within marketplace lending: consumer, small business and real estate.

Overall Marketplace Lending Return at 7.28%

One could almost say my returns are in a downward spiral. Since peaking in Q1 2014 at 12.44% my returns have decreased pretty much every quarter and for the last two years that decrease has averaged around 0.5% per quarter. Two years ago I stood at 11.3% and my weakest Lending Club account earned a respectable 8.19% and the average return of my original six accounts was 9.51%. Times have indeed changed since then.

This past quarter my overall returns stood at 7.28% and the returns for my original six accounts were 5.07%. My worst Lending Club account was my original account there and it came in at 1.95% for the year. The only good news, if there was any, was that I did not have a negative quarter in any of my accounts this quarter unlike in Q1.

For those readers who may be new to my quarterly returns post the reason for the drop in my returns are issues, primarily at Lending Club, in the D and E grade loans issued in late 2015 and early 2016. These have underperformed significantly, particular the 36-month loans, and these are the loans I have made the bulk of my portfolio. Now, I made some adjustments at the start of this year but these loans are still defaulting at higher than expected rate and it will be the end of the year I expect before I will see things begin to improve.

Now on to the numbers. Click the table below to see it at full size.

As you look at the above table you should take note of the following points:

  1. All the account totals and interest numbers are taken from my monthly statements that I download each month.
  2. The Net Interest column is the total interest earned plus late fees and recoveries less charge-offs.
  3. The Average Rate column shows the weighted average interest rate taken directly from Lending Club or Prosper.
  4. The XIRR ROI column shows my real world return for the trailing 12 months (TTM). I believe the XIRR method is the best way for individual investors to determine their actual return.
  5. The six older accounts have been separated out to provide a level of continuity with my earlier updates.
  6. I do not take into account the impact of taxes.

Now, I will break down each of my investments from the above table grouped by company. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Peer to Peer Lending Tagged With: Lending Club, Prosper, Quarterly Results, ROI, XIRR

Views: 664

My Quarterly Marketplace Lending Results – Q1 2017

My latest quarterly investment results show an overall 7.73% return for the year ending March 31, 2017

May 22, 2017 By Peter Renton 10 Comments

Views: 150

It is that time again when I share my investment returns. I like sharing these details because I believe in transparency and I know people are interested in my returns and how they are trending over time. I started out in marketplace lending many years ago with just Lending Club and Prosper but slowly have added new investments over the years. I included a relatively new account this quarter, StreetShares, they are a small business lender with a difference – you can read about them here and also listen to my podcast with the co-founders from last year.

Overall Marketplace Lending Return at 7.73%

The downward trend continues unabated in my returns. And while I said last quarter that was my worst ever, unfortunately I can now say the same again. In fact, this quarter set new lows, with one of my Lending Club accounts actually losing money during the quarter. This is the first time that has happened with any of my marketplace lending accounts.

I complained last quarter that the annualized return, based just on the latest quarterly numbers, on my main Lending Club account had dropped to 2.1% in Q4. Well, this quarter it dipped further. The balance on this account on December 31, 2016 was $39,733, the balance on March 31, 2017 was $39,472 for a -2.6% annualized return according to Lending Club’s own statements. I have had negative months here and there but never before have I experienced a negative quarter at Lending Club or Prosper since I started investing almost eight years ago.

When I look at where the recent defaults have been coming from the majority are in the D and E grade 36-month loans issued in 2015. These loan grades have underperformed significantly, something we covered in some depth earlier this year. When I said last quarter that I hoped the worst is behind us that clearly was not the case. I now expect my returns to continue to drift downward as more of this 2015 vintage hits their peak default months.

Now on to the numbers. Click the table below to see it at full size.

As you look at the above table you should take note of the following points: [Read more…]

Filed Under: Peer to Peer Lending Tagged With: Lending Club, Prosper, Quarterly Results, ROI, XIRR

Views: 150

My Quarterly Marketplace Lending Results – Q4 2016

My latest quarterly investment results show an overall 8.07% return for the 2016 calendar year.

February 22, 2017 By Peter Renton 24 Comments

Views: 74

Regular readers know that this is one the most popular features on Lend Academy. I have been sharing my detailed quarterly returns with readers since 2011 and I will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. I know investors are most interested in returns, in particular how they have been trending over time. You can go back and look at the breakdown of my investments every quarter for the past five years.

Overall P2P Lending Return at 8.07%

The good news, if there was any this past quarter, is that my declining returns have stabilized somewhat. My overall trailing twelve month (TTM) return in Q4 2016 was 8.07% compared to 8.21% in Q3 2016. I am taking this as good news because in every quarter for the previous one and a half years my returns had dropped 0.5% or more. Comparing the year ago quarter the picture is still not pretty – my TTM return in Q4 2015 was 9.85% so I am down almost 2% since then.

I have been thinking for some time that my returns have just about reached bottom but now I am not so sure. The reality is that Q4 was the worst quarter I have ever had if you look at it in isolation. Just taking a look at my six mature Lending Club and Prosper accounts the TTM return for those accounts was 6.75%, but the annualized return just for Q4 was just 5.3%. And if you look at my main Lending Club account that was opened in 2009 the numbers were even worse – the annualized Q4 return on that account was just 2.1%.

Overall my defaults in Q4 were the highest they have ever been. Several of my Lending Club accounts had negative months where the charge-offs were more than the total interest earned. December seemed to be a little better and January was also decent so I am hoping the worst is behind us. We are all paying for the mistakes made by Lending Club and Prosper in 2015 as they clearly mispriced many of their loans, particularly those in the higher risk loan grades where my portfolio is focused. They have since increased interest rates and tightened underwriting considerably so we should see better results from 2016 and 2017 vintages. But the reality is I still have many loans in my portfolio from 2015 that are late and will eventually default.

If you are interested in more analysis of the Lending Club and Prosper loans issued in 2015 you should read this excellent analysis done by Ryan recently.

Now on to the details. Click the table below to see it at full size.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Peer to Peer Lending Tagged With: Lending Club, Prosper, Quarterly Results, ROI, XIRR

Views: 74

My Quarterly P2P Lending Results – Q2 2016

The latest update of my quarterly investment results shows a return of 8.72% over the past 12 months.

August 24, 2016 By Peter Renton 13 Comments

Views: 41

Sharing the details of my returns is one of the regular features on Lend Academy and one that I am quite passionate about. It is also the feature that I get the most emails about – people really like to see actual returns on seasoned investments. I have been investing since 2009 and opening up my accounts for the world to see since Q4 2011.

You can go back and follow my journey from an investment that has grown from $84,000 in Q4 2010 to around $681,000 today. Now, I have added substantially to my initial investments and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. Eventually, I plan to have a diversified seven-figure portfolio made up of consumer, small business and real estate loans.

Overall P2P Lending Return at 8.72%

Now on to the numbers. Once again my trailing twelve month (TTM) returns have dropped from the previous quarter. While still a respectable 8.72% it is down from 11.30% just a year ago and also down from 9.28% last quarter. This is a trend that has continued for a couple of years now but I expect I am close to the bottom (assuming the economy still keeps chugging along). While declining interest rates and increasing defaults have been the norm for some time now there are signs this trend is coming to an end. The average interest rate on most of my accounts has risen in the past quarter as the platforms have raised rates quite aggressively this year. My six core holdings, those that have been opened the longest, also continued their decline to come in at a TTM return of 8.01%.

Now on to the details. Click the table below to see it at full size.

P2P Lending Returns Q2 2016

As you look at the above table you should take note of the following points: [Read more…]

Filed Under: Peer to Peer Lending Tagged With: Lending Club, Prosper, Quarterly Results, ROI, XIRR

Views: 41

My Quarterly P2P Lending Results – Q1 2016

My latest quarterly investment results show an overall 9.28% return for the year ending March 31, 2016.

May 24, 2016 By Peter Renton 41 Comments

Views: 86

We have had quite a month of news here in the P2P lending industry. But now I want to return to a regular feature on the blog, something that I have been doing since 2011: sharing my quarterly returns.

I like sharing the details of my investment returns because I believe in transparency and I know returns are what motivates many, if not most, investors. I started out with just Lending Club and Prosper but slowly have added new investments over the years all focused on the lending space. I included a relatively new account this quarter, P2Binvestor, they are an asset-backed small business lending platform open to accredited investors – you can read my original review here.

I have a total of 11 accounts now, most are with Lending Club or Prosper and I will be adding new accounts to this list over the coming year as I am adding new money into a couple of different real estate platforms. I have a relatively large exposure to unsecured consumer credit, small business loans through Direct Lending Investments and now I want to diversify a little more into real estate. More on this later in the year. Now, let’s get right to the numbers.

Overall P2P Lending Return Now at 9.28%

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Peer to Peer Lending Tagged With: Lending Club, Net Annualized Return, Prosper, Quarterly Results, ROI, XIRR

Views: 86

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LendIt Fintech News, Powered by Lend Academy, has been bringing you all the news and information about fintech and online lending since 2010 when it was founded by Peter Renton. We not only have the industry’s most active news site, but also the largest investor forum and the first and most popular podcast.

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