Opinion

September 30, 2015 @ 10:21 pm By JD Alois  |  

Online lending is undergoing a bit of an introspective period.  The US Department of Treasury published a request for information which posed multiple questions to industry participants and interested observers.  The UK P2PFA took the opportunity to share their point of view from across the… Read More

September 30, 2015 @ 11:47 am By JD Alois  |  

Lending Club (NYSE:LC), the largest marketplace lending platform in the US today, has submitted their opinion to the US Department of Treasury request for information (RFI) on the eve of the deadline for comments of September 30th, 2015.  Lending Club, the first publicly traded online lending… Read More

September 28, 2015 @ 11:14 am By JD Alois  |  

Outgoing SEC Commissioner Daniel Gallagher presented a statement at the opening of the SEC Advisory Committee on Small and Emerging Companies (ACSEC).  Gallagher lauded the group’s commitment, energy and dedication over the past two years calling the members work “critical in helping to bring forward… Read More

September 25, 2015 @ 6:33 pm By Ian Ippolito  |  

Revolutionary technology is rarely useful or successful right away. Gutenberg’s printing press was a commercial failure until he decided to print the Bible. PC’s were obscure curiosities until the invention of the spreadsheet. Even the Internet was just an academic toy until the invention of… Read More

September 25, 2015 @ 2:24 pm By JD Alois  |  

Writing for the EveningStandard, Anthony Hilton states there are rumblings that a UK peer to peer lending firm may soon go under.  Hilton calls the alleged event a possible “crash” and a “mess”. While Hilton poses his statement as a question, it is certainly a… Read More

September 24, 2015 @ 10:46 pm By JD Alois  |  

As 2015 enters Q4, and the days grow shorter, time is running out for final rules regarding Title III of the JOBS Act, otherwise known as retail crowdfunding. During most of 2014, Chair White stated completion of JOBS Act rules were a priority, raising hope… Read More

September 21, 2015 @ 6:00 am By Georgia Quinn  |  

It was bittersweet walking into Commissioner Daniel Gallagher’s office for the first and last time. He has been a true champion for small business and access to capital and we all owe him a debt of gratitude. It was also wholly appropriate that the amazing… Read More

September 20, 2015 @ 9:38 pm By JD Alois  |  

The financial sector in China is changing perhaps more radically, and more quickly, than in any other sovereign nation in the world.  The industry is being compelled to adjust to the realities of slowing economy and a banking sector that was not created to provide… Read More

September 18, 2015 @ 1:47 pm By JD Alois  |  

In a somewhat controversial regulatory approach, the state of Washington, Department of Financial Institutions, has indicated its interest in requiring issuers to file with the state when utilizing Tier 2 of Regulation A+.  The new exemption which preempts State Blue-Sky law and raises the investor… Read More

September 15, 2015 @ 11:00 pm By Barry James  |  

Crowdfunding and ‘Alt-Finance’ are of course one of the cornerstones of FinTech as key parts of the ‘Finance’ leg. Although FinTech is broader-based encompassing cryptocurrencies such as BitCoin and related technologies (especially Blockchain) as well as new and faster ways of transacting and transferring ‘legacy’… Read More

September 15, 2015 @ 10:27 am By Erin Hobey  |  

Silicon Valley can’t compete with London in terms of Fintech, says UK Treasury special Fintech envoy Eileen Burbidge: “Wall Street Talent doesn’t come to Silicon Valley.” UK Treasury special Fintech envoy and partner at tech VC Passion Capital, Eileen Burbidge took the stage at Fintech Week and discussed… Read More

September 13, 2015 @ 11:00 pm By Barry James  |  

The First #Fintech World Tour Over the last couple of months my team and I have been in ‘stealth mode’, as they say, quietly touring the world of #Fintech, joining the dots. In two weeks time I will fly from one of the two world… Read More

September 11, 2015 @ 11:06 am By Amy Wan  |  

  Since the SEC announced the intent to implement the new Regulation A+ rules in March, there’s been a lot of hype around the potential for Regulation A+. This newly implemented offering mechanism has been heralded for its ability to bring increased opportunities to the… Read More

September 10, 2015 @ 9:09 am By Ben Miller  |  

The investment crowdfunding space is on fire – growing by more than 1000% a year. Within real estate alone, total investment is projected to hit $2.5 billion by the end of December. Meanwhile, FinTech has become glorified as a revolution in finance ready to take… Read More

September 8, 2015 @ 8:00 am By Charles Clinton  |  

  If you’ve even casually followed the startup world over the last five years there’s a word that you’ve surely heard – disintermediation. It’s a fancy new word for a plain old business concept: cutting out the middleman. Disintermediation, to its devotees, is the role… Read More

September 7, 2015 @ 10:12 am By Ronald Kleverlaan  |  

The e-Residency project is an initiative of the Estonian government to offer every world citizen the possibility to become an e-Resident of Estonia. As a side effect they could solve a number of problems for current Crowdfunding platforms with this government backed e-identity program and boost the industry…. Read More

September 3, 2015 @ 4:00 pm By Midori Yoshimura  |  

  With the publication of the Small Business Borrowers’ Bill of Rights, one of the first consensuses on responsible small business lending practices, earlier this month, marketplace lending platforms including Funding Circle, Lending Club and Fundera showed their support for greater transparency for borrowers and accountability for platforms and… Read More

September 3, 2015 @ 1:01 am By Midori Yoshimura  |  

    In Germany, investment crowdfunding is doing well–both debt-based and equity-based crowdfunding jumped notably in Q1 2015 versus Q4 of 2014, according to numbers from the German Crowdfunding Network. What of the country’s peer-to-peer lending? Dominik Steinkuehler, co-founder and CEO of Lendico, a multinational P2P lending platform,… Read More

September 2, 2015 @ 5:00 pm By Bret Conkin and Alixe Cormick  |  

Causes and Lessons to be learned from more Developed Markets In this three-part series, we examine whether “conservative” Canadian business culture is having a negative effect on equity crowdfunding taking hold in Canada.  In Part I of this series we took a snapshot of equity… Read More

September 2, 2015 @ 9:06 am By JD Alois  |  

Paul Niederer, CEO of ASSOB  – a trailblazing investment crowdfunding platform in Australia, makes a very valid point. Regulators are too rooted in the past and they are at risk of botching the future as the finance industry inevitably moves online. Australia is in the… Read More