Investment Platforms and Marketplaces

April 19, 2015 @ 10:54 pm By JD Alois  |  

FlyingV may be the largest crowdfunding platform in Asia today.  Based in Taiwan, the platform has led the space in Taiwan, and in many respects Asia general.  Crowdfund Insider interviewed Tim Cheng, CEO of FlyingV, late in 2014 to hear about his viewpoint on the crowdfunding space…. Read More

April 19, 2015 @ 10:51 am By JD Alois  |  

Assetz Capital hopes to run £ 1 billion in loans by the end of 2016 and they have a good start in getting there. The peer to peer lender launched in April of 2013 and has funded over £70 million in secured lending and states… Read More

April 18, 2015 @ 5:37 pm By JD Alois  |  

Peer to peer lender Lufax raised equity late last month. Crowdfund Insider reported the China based direct lender raised approximately $483 million or 3 billion yuan. Now a report in WSJ.com places a valuation of the P2P lender at nearly $10 billion making it one… Read More

April 18, 2015 @ 12:08 pm By JD Alois  |  

Vince Passione, LendKey CEO, cemented a $1 billion deal to re-finance student loans as he positions his company to challenge marketplace lending platforms like SoFi and CommonBond. This may be the biggest funding deal to date and is just further evidence of the intense interest… Read More

April 18, 2015 @ 7:37 am By Samantha Hurst  |  

In an effort to help those seeking money for medical/health campaigns, crowdfunding platform Indiegogo shared some tips on how these type projects can ultimately receive the funds they need. The popular funding platform’s Breanna DiGiammarino stated: “Crowdfunding proved an effective aid for the Villanova family, as well as thousands of others… Read More

April 17, 2015 @ 3:11 pm By Samantha Hurst  |  

Ready to make a few changes to its reward-based crowdfunding platform, RocketHub announced this week that it has been acquired by entrepreneur networking site, EFactor for $15 million. According to Entrepreneur, RocketHub, which operates in over 190 different countries and regions, will continue to exist as its… Read More

April 17, 2015 @ 1:17 pm By JD Alois  |  

  Prosper President Ron Suber delivered an extremely well received keynote address at the LendIt conference held in Manhattan this past week.  Over 2400 attendees converged from around the globe to discuss the future of finance, one where banks are on the decline and peer to… Read More

April 16, 2015 @ 10:46 pm By JD Alois  |  

GLI, a UK based firm that is heavily invested in alternative finance, has invested in the first regulated peer to peer lending platform in Spain – MytripleA.  According to a company release, GLI lead a € 1 Million funding round, kicking in € 445,500 for a 9.9%… Read More

April 16, 2015 @ 10:04 pm By JD Alois  |  

Funding Wonder is the latest entrant into the peer to peer lending space. The company reports it soft-launched in September of 2014 and since that time has built a “qualified small business loan pipeline of over $5 million.  The company expects that number to grow… Read More

April 16, 2015 @ 4:32 pm By Samantha Hurst  |  

The Chairman of Cornwall’s Crowdfunder, Rob Love, will head up the #VOOM: Pitch to Rich panel in Brighton, in search of the best business minds across the UK Virgin Media Business’ Pitch to Rich 2015 competition to award Britain’s biggest ever business prize will be kick started… Read More

April 16, 2015 @ 4:17 pm By Samantha Hurst  |  

Offering up new ways for campaigns to become more successful, global crowdfunding platform Kickstarter recently unveiled its 96 Reward Ideas to help achieve funding goals. Team members, Carol Benovic and Sid Orlando, took to the platform’s blog and wrote: “Offering great rewards is one of the best ways to encourage support… Read More

April 16, 2015 @ 12:19 pm By Therese Torris  |  

French equity crowdfunding platform SmartAngels and the French arm of global insurer Allianz announced today the launch of a crowdfunding investment fund. Allianz’s customers will be able to use SmartAngels’ crowdfunding platform to invest in startups and high-growth companies. Allianz France will co-invest in the… Read More

April 16, 2015 @ 10:20 am By JD Alois  |  

Scott Hansma, recently the chief architect of global cloud computing company Salesforce, has joined the executive bench of Lending Club, the largest peer to peer lender in the country. Hansma will be adding his skill set and knowledge to the fast growing fintech firm as… Read More

April 16, 2015 @ 7:40 am By JD Alois  |  

Equity guru Jim Cramer invited one of the leading innovators in the peer to peer, or marketplace lending, space to swing by his Mad Money studio this week.  Renaud Laplanche, CEO and founder of Lending Club (NYSE:LC), the largest peer to peer lender in the… Read More

April 16, 2015 @ 12:46 am By Midori Yoshimura  |  

StartUp Health, a New York-based technology accelerator, is now among the earliest accelerators to begin health-investing syndicates on AngelList, according to a recent story in Wall Street Journal’s blog, Venture Capital Dispatch. The accelerator also calls itself an “academy,” due to its multi-year involvement with digital-health startups. Companies… Read More

April 15, 2015 @ 9:03 am By Erin Hobey  |  

The Singapore-based peer-to-peer (P2P) lending platform Capital Match which targets Singapore SMEs obtain loans financed by individual investors has launched. The company stated that its are two-fold, to provide business borrowers with the next best interest rates after banks and to give investors access to an attractive yield… Read More

April 15, 2015 @ 8:28 am By Erin Hobey  |  

gamesGRABR, the social network for gaming, has successfully raised more than £450,000 in its second round of funding on the Crowdcube platform, smashing its initial £250,000 target by over 80% and attracting 221 investors, including the London Co-investment Fund. “We are so proud of this latest round of… Read More

April 15, 2015 @ 2:00 am By Midori Yoshimura  |  

  OnDeck Capital, which offers short-term loans to businesses of between $5,000 and $250,000, and Prosper Marketplace, a peer-to-peer lending marketplace, today announced their new strategic partnership, according to a story in New York Business Journal. The partnership was made public at the LendIt financial tech conference… Read More

April 14, 2015 @ 4:39 pm By JD Alois  |  

Orchard, an investment and analytics firm that supports the global marketplace lending industry, has released Orchard Manager Database described as a” comprehensive resource for institutional investors to identify and evaluate the funds of marketplace (P2P) lending investment managers”. This new application is designed to provides large investors an ability… Read More

April 14, 2015 @ 4:22 pm By Samantha Hurst  |  

Crowdfunded Book Publisher Launches “Collections” Feature with Science Fiction/Fantasy Publishing Contest Inkshares, a start-up crowdfunded book publisher, announced today a partnership with The Sword & Laser, an award-winning science fiction and fantasy podcast and community, to launch a feature called “Collections”—allowing third parties to run… Read More