A Bloomberg article reports that Prosper seeks to be regulated like a bank in order to avoid the jurisdiction of the SEC.
Countries
P2P Lending With Cars as Collateral
German p2p lending service Auxmoney.com has introduced a new feature this week. Borrowers can now offer a car as collateral for a p2p loan.
The user pays a fee of 9.95 Euro to document this in his loan listing. Pictures of the car, the model and the mileage and the estimated price a car dealer would pay for car are displayed in the listing. In this example listing, the borrower puts up his BMW as collateral. The estimated value covers 101% of the loan amount requested. In general the car can cover any percentage of the loan amount – it does not need to cover the full amount. Furthermore there is information on the type of insurance coverage.
If the loan is funded, then a contract defines the terms of the assignment as security. The borrower continues to drive the car (obviously he is not allowed to sell it without the consent of Auxmoney), but needs to deposit the certificate of ownership (motor vehicle registration certificate) at Auxmoney. This arrangement costs the borrower 2 Euro per month.
Should the borrower fail to repay the loan, then Auxmoney has the right to sell the car.
While a car as collateral does in not provide fail-safe security (many things can happen), it will be probably perceived by lenders as one feature for higher security against defaults.
The Wiseclerk Auxmoney stats page will in future track the performance of p2p loans secured by cars.
This is a first for p2p lending – but soon another p2p lending service will follow. Pärtel Tomberg, CEO of Estonian p2p lending service Isepankur told P2P-Banking.com earlier this month, that Isepankur will introduce cars and real estate as collateral for p2p loans in the second half of 2010.
(Photo by pedrosimoes7)
Lending Club Introduces 5 Year Loans
P2P lending service Lending Club did up to now only offer 3 year loans. Today Lending Club adds 5 year loans.
Zidisha Selected as Echoing Green Finalist
Congratulations to Zidisha for reaching the finalist round for the Echoing Green grant, which provides early seed funding for innovative social enterprises. Echoing Green is known for its ability to discover highly successful models of social change at the early start-up phase. Continue reading
Valuation Of Prosper Shares by VCs Dropped in Series D Round
Fred’s blog has an analysis of the financial data of the series D funding round Prosper Marketplace recently completed. The analysis shows that the valuation by the VCs per share issued dropped from 9.69 US$ per share in round C (June 2007) to 0.72 US$ per share in round D.
CommunityLend Taps Broker Market
Canadian p2p lending service CommunityLend announces:
MorWEB partners with CommunityLend Inc. to provide direct access to
unsecured lending options for the Canadian Mortgage Broker market
Marlborough Stirling Canada (MSC) is pleased to announce that direct access to CommunityLend, Canada’s only online Peer-to-Peer lending service, will now be available to the broker market using MorWEB.
MorWEB brokers will now be able to seamlessly refer clients directly to CommunityLend to arrange unsecured loans from private investors. This will provide another value added service to customers of mortgage brokers using MorWEB. Phase one of this novel integration is now available on the MorWEB platform with a more comprehensive integration scheduled for later this year.
CommunityLend, …, launched earlier this year and is exploring a number of different marketing options to spread the word about its services and to recruit good quality borrowers looking for more competitive rates for small unsecured loans.
â€We are excited by the opportunity to work with one of Canada’s leading software providers to the Mortgage industry,†noted Michael Garrity, CEO of CommunityLend. “We understand the important role of Mortgage Brokers in helping their clients to find the best rates on loans to meet their needs. …â€
Since CommunityLend is restricted to accredited investors* by regulation, this marketing move uses an existing multiplier to reach potential lenders. It continues the earlier reported trend of existing financial institutions partnering with new p2p lending players.
(Source: CommunityLend blog)
*corrected – an earlier version of the article wrongly stated “institutional lenders” – see comment below