Current Account Fraud Rises
The Independent is reporting that current account fraud is rising.
I suppose this will only afect the man on the Dalston Omnibus, if the banks don’t make sure they check applications correctly.
Bad News From Zopa
I had some bad news today, when I was informed that Zopa don’t think one of my lenders will pay me any more money.
I lent him £20 in May 2009 at 8.9% and I’ve now lost £1.48 on the deal.
I’ll just buy one less coffee today, than I would have done!
Zopa Gets Very Stable
I’ve said before that Zopa could be a classic stable system.
Over the last three weeks, the rates I’m charging to lend out money on Zopa have hardly changed. I set them just under the top limit of the Zone Of Possible Agreement, that gives Zopa its name. The rate for the B, A and A* markets have been 7.6, 6.7 and 6.3 respectively for the last ten days now, which isn’t a bad rate.
Not bad that is, before tax and for effectively three years!
My rate this year so far is 4.58%. It’s been distorted a bit as I’m loading money into Zopa like crazy.
How Long Does It Take To Lend Out £10,000 On Zopa?
£10,000 was transferred into my Zopa account on the 23rd of August. It did take a couple of days or so to actually arrive after leaving my bank account, but then that is the bank transfer system.
Surely in this day and age, it can be an instant event!
My old mate, David, once said that banks make up to a third of their money on overnight lending. So my £10,000 for two days lent out at only three per cent, whilst in the care of the banks would make them about £1.64. Not much, you may think, but it’s pure profit and how much money is there in the system? I bet they lend it at a higher rate than three per cent too.
After the £10,000 arrived in my Zopa account on the 22nd, on the 23rd, I had £11,960.43 either offered for lending or being processed.
A week later and that figure is down to £9060.43. So effectively £2,900 has now been lent out. £9,300 in total is being processed, but some of that comes from money that has been reinvested.
So it would appear that Zopa has a processing limit.
Is This A Zopa Advantage?
Zopa doesn’t process contracts at the weekend. Or it doesn’t appear to! This might be because they have to interface with the credit agencies and the banks and those don’t work 24/7.
So with the bank holiday tomorrow, it will be interesting to see how the money I have on offer disappears. Last week I loaded my account with £10,000, so there is plenty of money there.
On Saturday morning, I had £650 being processed in 13 contracts. These will probably start being sorted on Tuesday.
This morning it was £3350 in 67 contracts.
As I write now at 22:43 on Sunday, it’s £4,700 in 94 contracts. The last of those contracts was setup about 22:15. I’m watching to see if this is the last contract of the night.
Do Zopa have a cut-off time for loans or if say you applied at 04:00, would you be taken seriously? I wonder what Warclays would say if you applied for a loan at that hour?
If Zopa does accept loan applications at any hour, that must surely be a business advantage, as well as one for the customer, as we all have those times, when we prefer to fill in forms.
I’ll finish now for a bit. but I’ll update this in the morning.
I didn’t get any more contracts last night and when I went to bed at around midnight, there were still 94 contracts.
I got up just before seven on Monday and another had dropped off, so the number was now down to 93.
As I type this at 08:00, the number of contracts being processed is now 96. So people are still applying for loans. How many other places could you apply for a loan at this time on a bank holiday morning?
The clue is in the words bank holiday!
It’s now 12:00 and the number of contracts being processed has risen to 113.
And now it’s 18:22 with the contracts standing at 140.
21:22 and it’s 151.
It’s now Tuesday morning at 11:00. None of the flood of offers from the weekend have been fully processed yet, but that queue is now at 157.
I’ve also heard from Zopa and they say that they’re a 24/7 operation as regards to applying, but that obviously processing is usually done on a nine to five basis, Monday to Friday. But they are starting to do this on some weekends.
It’s now 13:00 and the processing has climbed to 166. Of the ten grand I put in, I have just about two grand left to lend out.
It’s now 15:42 and we’re at 170. Nothing seems to have accepted and signed off yet!
It’s now 18:10 and 20 contracts have been fully accepted and signed off. I’m not sure how many were not accepted, but it can’t have been more than a few!
Disruptive Innovation
I’ve not heard the term before, but read this article. It starts with this question and answer.
Question: what do these companies have in common?
Skype, Spotify, Marks and Spencer, Whipcar, Zopa, Zilok, Kiva, Patagonia, Kickstarter, Café Direct, Taskrabbit, Buzzcar and InterfaceFLOR.
Two of my favourite innovators; Zopa and Kiva are mentioned in the same breath as quite a few companies like, Skype, Spotify and M&S.
If the article has a fault, it’s that it misses out a couple of well known names, who the writer would call disruptive innovators.
I would have thought ARM Holdings and Dyson should be on the list. And I would think that a certain company called Metier Management Systems was one of the first! So we were only a shark in a small pond, but we completely rebuilt the pond.
IPPR Says Fuel Prices Should Rise
The IPPR is reported to be saying that fuel prices should rise, much to the dismay of motorists. It’s all here in the Telegraph.
I don’t care what happens to fuel prices personally, as I don’t have a car and I get my public transport in the London area free.
But I’ve always felt that fuel prices are too low, as this increases consumption, which increases global warming. It also reduces the pressure for vehicle manufacturers to make more fuel-efficient vehicles.
Concerning the latter, I have a lot of hybrid-buses near me, including of course, the New Bus for London. All of these hybrid buses deliver much higher lower fuel consumption and in addition, quantities of black smoke and noise.
Rises in fuel prices would improve our vehicles in other ways.
A Better Way To Pay By Credit Card?
There are certain things, I don’t like where money is concerned.
The first is smart-phones, as they are just status symbols, beloved of the light-fingered. So if anybody suggests that I need those to do things like buy a train ticket, a coffee or a pair of knickers, or even replace my rail ticket then I say a big no!
I don’t like too to always have to carry more than one payment card. At present, I usually carry two; my Freedom Pass for transport in London and usually my John Lewis/Waitrose credit card for purchases. I would like to be like the Queen and not carry any cash, but as I do like coffee, which is almost as good as milk for my throat, I’ve always got a few coins in my pocket. So I have a small folder with these cards, my Senior Railcard and a few of my business cards in my pocket. My wallet stays at home most of the time, when I’m in London. I did lose the folder once and within a few hours, the bus driver had phoned me saying he’d got it and I could get it from the garage.
So I was rather intrigued, when I saw in the Sunday Times, an article about Square, a payment company started by one of people who brought us Twitter. You upload your picture, a recording of your name and credit card details to a web site and then when you go into say Starbucks, their iPad app recognises you and your name recording is the password. You can get your receipt as a text message to any phone as new as a Nokia 6310i. I knew I was right about smart phones being dead end technology. Nothing will persuade me to get one. If for instance, a shop, a theatre or a train company said I must have a smart phone to purchase their product, then I will make sure that I take my business elsewhere and give them all the bad publicity they deserve.
I can’t wait to walk into Starbucks on Upper Street, say “Anonymous Widower” and get my cappuccino.
Living Near Premier League Grounds
The Halifax has done a survey of house prices near Premier League grounds. It’s here in the Telegraph.
As I live within walking distance of the Emirates Stadium, I’m not bothered, especially as I have a buy-to-let close to both Old Trafford and Carrow Road. Don’t ask me why an Ipswich supporter should have those! But suffice to say, they were purchases my late wife made without consulting me. Although, I did think that nearness to football grounds could be an advantage.
Thoughts On Zopa’s Rapid Return
Zopa has a system called Rapid Return, which allows you to sell on loans.
I haven’t picked up a loan through someone else wanting to pass it on for over a year now.
Judging by the rules for Rapid Return, which mean that any loan that has missed a payment can’t be passed on and looking at the statistics for my loans, I would suspect it’s not a lack of eligible loans, but more that people are holding on to their loans. And especially the good ones! They’ve no choice with bad loans.
So does this mean that Zopa is attracting a credit-worthy class of borrower? If so, that’s good news.
The Anonymous Widower 