The Anonymous Widower

Ivan Massow Joins Peer-to-Peer Lending

Peer-to-peer lending is growing fast, with new companies starting up seemingly every week.

Now entrepreneur, Ivan Massow has joined the party with a company called Massow’s Angels.

This was reported in the Independent yesterday, under a title of How Peers Can Solve Borrowing Headaches.

This is part of the report.

Funding Circle recently reported that its customers invested £6.1m in the first two months of this year and the total amount saved and borrowed at Zopa, the UK’s first peer-to-peer website, passed the £200m mark last week. Such growth prompted Andy Haldane, the head of policy at the Bank of England, to say that such peer-to-peer lenders could ultimately replace high street banks.

As if the banks hadn’t got enough problems.

Note that the Indie talks about the Peer-to-Peer Finance Association, which is a trade body created to ensure standards in the industry.

I have lent money through Zopa for several years now and get a reasonable return. In some ways though, my guarantee is in the figures, that I track every day in a spreadsheet and the fact that the company is totally open about the processes it uses. The processes must work, as at the end of May 2011, I’d earned 6 % since the start of that year.  The figure is now 9.3 % for 2012, with ten days to go of the month of May.

May 21, 2012 - Posted by AnonW | Finance, News | Banks, Zopa