Friday morning was a noticeably quieter day on the floor of Olympia, we assumed at first that it was due to the fabled late night MIPIM parties but as the day progressed there was no real pick up in delegates. At one point it felt like there were more exhibitors walking round than delegates and by 2pm there were quite a few empty stands.
Luckily for us by 9am the Government announced that in addition to the existing cash and equity ISA, that they were consulting on a new third ISA specifically for peer to peer lending. This has the potential to be the institutional wall of money that everyone keeps on intimating will ruin the market for the individual lenders, effectively squeezing them out the market. Tax free lending via an ISA will keep the individuals firmly in control of the market. In a recent survey, Proplend found that 85% of those surveyed would P2P lend via an ISA when available.
It’s been a good three days for Proplend at MIPIM and we are glad that we made the decision to attend the inaugural London event, we ran the gauntlet of protestors day 1, have met lots of potential lenders, interested borrowers and fellow exhibitors. If the organisers can come up with a closing event to draw in more delegates on the final day, then we look forward to seeing you all again at MIPIM UK 2015.
P.S. the lucky winner of the Jeroboam of Bollinger will be contacted directly.
