August 15, 2016 @ 11:55 am By JD Alois  |  

4thWay, a research and rating firm that wants to be the “Morningstar” of peer to peer lending, has published a list of P2P lenders that have achieved their highest rating of 5/5 stars or “PLUSes”. The 6 plaforms are as follows: Funding Circle, Landbay, Lending… Read More

August 15, 2016 @ 10:33 am By JD Alois  |  

In November of 2015, a group of well-known tech names banded together to create a new lobbying entity to lobby Capitol Hill on Fintech and financial regulations. Financial Innovation Now is a unique alliance of Apple, Google, Amazon, Intuit and Paypal joining in one specific… Read More

August 15, 2016 @ 8:50 am By JD Alois  |  

The UK’s largest investment crowdfunding platform by total amount raised will be closing its most recent self-crowdfunding round in less than 24 hours. The offer currently stands overfunded at £6.95 million on an initial goal of £5 million. The offer page indicates that  so far… Read More

August 14, 2016 @ 7:56 pm By JD Alois  |  

Scottish Financial Enterprise (SFE) is targeting the Fintech sector for future growth. SFE is the representative group for Scotland’s financial services industry. Members are not just big banks but also smaller financial firms. Financial services account for one in every ten jobs in Scotland so… Read More

August 14, 2016 @ 7:14 pm By JD Alois  |  

Bala Srinivasa, a partner at the VC firm of Kalaari Capital, recently published an interesting post on India and the development of Fintech in the country. While Fintech has gone hyperbolic in China, and the US, Europe, and the rest of Asia has seen steady… Read More

August 14, 2016 @ 6:41 pm By JD Alois  |  

Heather Cox was named head of Citi Fintech in October 2015.  After less than a year of attempting to guide one of the largest banks in the world through the Fintech revolution, it appears that Cox has had enough and has moved on to USAA…. Read More

August 13, 2016 @ 2:07 pm By JD Alois  |  

Crowdlending.fr  has published a “barometer of activity” regarding online lending performance. As many people know, things tend to slow dow during the summer in France. Especially in July and August as the population heads for the beaches in the south or the west.  But the… Read More

August 13, 2016 @ 1:37 pm By JD Alois  |  

Hops & Grain, a craft brewery based in Austin, Texas, has raised $1 million on Wefunder – the maximum amount they are able to raise under Reg CF. The crowdfunding offer set a minimum goal of raising just $50,000 and quickly topped that amount. The… Read More

August 12, 2016 @ 6:27 pm By JD Alois  |  

Dianrong, a very large peer to peer lender in China (far bigger than any platform in the US), did some chest pounding yesterday.  In a release, Dianrong claimed the US Department of Commerce named the Chinese online lender the “Leader in China’s P2P Lending Segment.”… Read More

August 12, 2016 @ 1:06 pm By JD Alois  |  

  In 2015 Banks participated in under 10% of reported Fintech venture deals. The total investment was around $5 billion for the banking industry. But they spent $50 billion updating legacy tech and fixing already installed applications as they struggled to keep up with the… Read More

August 12, 2016 @ 10:59 am By JD Alois  |  

SoFi, one of the largets online lenders in the US, has settled a class action lawsuit regarding “hard credit” inquiries for potential borrowers. Under the terms of the agreement, SoFi will pay a $2.4 million fine which includes $625,000 in fees and $48,000 in cost reimbursements… Read More

August 12, 2016 @ 7:51 am By JD Alois  |  

Peer to peer lender ThinCats has updated its system for SME loan grading. The online lender has released a “unique system” developed by Rolf Hickman, described as a pioneer in credit analysis.  Hickman was founder and CEO of the pH Group, now part of Experian,… Read More

August 11, 2016 @ 10:27 pm By JD Alois  |  

Singapore-based crowdfunding platform CoAssets is preparing to list on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) later this month. CoAssets is already traded on the NSX (CAX) but the move up to the primary exchange is viewed as enhancing credibility for the investment platform.  CoAssets is already… Read More

August 11, 2016 @ 4:51 pm By JD Alois  |  

Property Partner, a real estate crowdfunding platform, has added an interesting feature to their investment marketplace. Property Partner now allows individual investors to bid on property posted on the site.  Property Partner also states their new feature improves clarity for sellers too. According to a… Read More

August 11, 2016 @ 3:01 pm By JD Alois  |  

Estonia based EstateGuru has announced having surpassed €10 million in peer to peer lending for over 60 real estate projects. EstateGuru has been in operation for two years. Headquartered in Tallinn, Estonia – a country that has a vibrant startup scene, founders Marek Pärtel, Marko Arro… Read More

August 11, 2016 @ 8:42 am By JD Alois  |  

Equity crowdfunding platform Seedrs has recently surveyed their customers on Brexit fallout and the results are encouraging. While the number of respondents were small (120), according to Seedrs, 52% of respondents believe London will maintain the title of global hub for international entrepreneurs even with… Read More

August 10, 2016 @ 2:55 pm By JD Alois  |  

NextGen Crowdfunding is hosting another live-stream event.  Today (August 10th) at 4PM ET or 1PM PT, Dr. Richard Swart, will be hosting a 2 part series that will help educate both investors in equity crowdfunding and companies that are considering using equity crowdfunding to raise… Read More

August 10, 2016 @ 2:47 pm By JD Alois  |  

PwC is out with another report this time focusing on the Payments sector. This is part of their broader research into Fintech in general and how it is impacting traditional financial firms and what they are doing to mitigate the operational risk.  Entitled “Payments in… Read More

August 10, 2016 @ 11:55 am By JD Alois  |  

Back in May, Prosper started a monthly update on performance of loans on their marketplace lending platform. The added transparency is welcomed insight – especially for smaller investors. Today, Brad Pennington, CRO of Prosper, published the July 2016 performance report. He stated that expected returns… Read More

August 10, 2016 @ 11:14 am By JD Alois  |  

Fundnel alumni Spark Asia has secured a partnership with  JustKapture in India. Fundnel is a southeast Asia investment crowdfunding ecosystem that funds and mentors Asian startups. Spark Asia was the winner of Fundnel’s “Everyday Ideas” competition last year and was subsequently incubated on Fundnel while receiving pre-seed… Read More