As 2015 draws to a close, it’s been an exciting year for both Proplend and the Peer-to-Peer Sector.
Proplend has seen exciting growth. We have arranged nearly 6 times the volume of loans as we did in 2014. We are pleased to announce that all loans are currently in good standing with no late payments or borrower defaults, and we hope to maintain this momentum throughout 2016. We have a couple of exciting platform developments, which are scheduled to be released by the end of Q1 2016, so watch this space.
As an industry, Peer-to-Peer Lending has also had an exciting year:
- Happy Birthday, the P2P industry celebrated its 10th birthday. Big thanks to Zopa for starting it all off.
- Volumes across the sector from consumer loans to SME loans to property loans are all showing continued levels of growth, with nearly £2.5billion Peer to Peer loans dispersed in total.
- The main 3 UK platforms are close to having lent £500m each over the course of the year. One platform has broken the £1 billion total cumulative lend and the other two are tantalisingly close.
- The Treasury confirmed that the new Innovative Finance ISA (IFISA) would launch in April 2016. Although in the past two weeks, there have been some contradictory updates from HMRC as to which platforms will or will not be allowed to issue P2P IFISAs. Let’s see what happens.
- 2015 saw the first big P2P failure, Trust Buddy, a Swedish platform that declared themselves bankrupt after alleged misuse of client monies.
- Partnerships – not only have banks on both sides of the Atlantic cosied up to Peer to Peer platforms, but they have even become the disruptors themselves with Zopa partnering with Uber to help drivers buy their cars.
- And finally regulation – the end of 2015 saw the cut off for Platforms making their FCA application for full regulatory status. The latest news from the FCA is that it could take up to 12 months for full permissions to be granted.
2016 Predictions:
- Volumes to increase again by over 100% year on year
- An increase in the number of Alternative Finance Investment Trusts
- The first UK platform to IPO
- A UK platform failure
On behalf of the Proplend team, thank you for your support over the last year and I wish you and your families a happy holiday season and all success in the coming year.
Brian Bartaby, CEO & Founder
