I have to admit, it was a little surreal when the email came in. A congressional staffer emailed me while I was on vacation to ask if I would be interested in testifying in front of the House Committee on Small Business next week. The committee wants to learn more about peer to peer lending and how it applies to small business lending.
After a conversation with this staffer last week I found out on Thursday that I have been invited to testify. So, on Wednesday morning (May 13) at 11am ET I will be on Capitol Hill discussing this industry with some of the leaders of this country. Also testifying will be Sam Hodges of Funding Circle, an MIT professor and a small business owner. If you are interested you can watch these proceedings live here:
https://smallbusiness.house.gov/legislation/live.htm
I believe they also make these videos available on the committee’s YouTube channel after the fact so if you can’t watch it on Wednesday you should be able to view it later. I will have a post about my experiences later in the week.
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.