Poland

P2P Lending Service Lendico Launches in Poland

wiseclerk

Today Lendico launched its p2p lending service in Poland. Poland is the third market Lendico serves, after Germany and Spain. Loan amounts can be between 1,000 and 50,000 PLN (approx 16,400 US$). Loan terms are from 1 to 5 years and interest rates range from 5.82% to 14.99%. Currently there are 8 open loan listings. Lendico maintains an office in Warsaw. There are already other p2p lending service operating in Poland (e.g. Kokos and Finansowo – which in 2010 merged with Smava Poland).

From the polish press release:

Na polskim rynku finansowym pojawił się nowy gracz: Lendico. To nowoczesna platforma pożyczek społecznościowych, która w bezpieczny sposób łączy pożyczkobiorców z osobami zainteresowanymi korzystną lokatą własnego kapitału. Dzięki temu pozwala uzyskiwać pożyczki na korzystnych warunkach oraz daje perspektywy inwestycji o wysokiej stopie zwrotu. W ten sposób Lendico oferuje produkt niedostępny dla klientów tradycyjnych banków.


Lendico Poland screenshot taken today

International P2P Lending Services – Loan Volumes February 2014

wiseclerk 2 Comments

Even though February was a short month, several p2p lending services topped their January loan volume. Even more impressive is the continued year on year growth. 3 more services were added to the table. I do monitor development of p2p lending figures for many markets. Since I already have most of the data on file I can publish statistics on the monthly loan originations for selected p2p lending services.

Table: P2P Lending Volumes in February 2014. Source: own research
Note that volumes have been converted from local currency to US$ for the sake of comparison. Some figures are estimates/approximations.

Notice to p2p lending services not listed:
If you want to be included in this chart in future, please email the following figures on the first working day of a month: total loan volume originated since inception, loan volume originated in previous month, number of loans originated in previous month, average nominal interest rate of loans originated in previous month.

P2P Lending Sites in Europe

wiseclerk 3 Comments

Visualizations are great to show data that would otherwise just be a long list. I decided to create a map of the p2p lending landscape in Europe. It shows active and discontinued p2p lending services in Europe (including p2p microfinance). Not listed are sites that are in pre-launch stage. All of these marketplaces have been featured earlier in the P2P-Banking.com blog. If you want more information about any of them just enter the name in the search box on the top right of this blog.

Notice to other websites: You are free to copy and use this map, provided you agree not to alter or resize the image and you will set a link to this article.

Notice to p2p lending sites: If you want to be included in a future version of this map, contact me to learn how.

Kokos Issues Prepaid Card, Adds SMS Loans

Michal Kisiel 2 Comments

Polish P2P lending market Kokos.pl announced today a new product – SMS loans coupled with prepaid MasterCard PayPass card. The product is targeted at borrowers who do not want to set up regular listing, but need quick “liquidity injection”.

The procedure of applying for SMS loan looks as follows:

  • Borrower receives prepaid card by post,
  • Enters the card’s account number and his verified cell phone number in his profile,
  • Whenever the user wants to borrow money, he sends a text message with the required amount and keyword (“pozycz” – borrow) to number 7550,
  • Kokos.pl sets up an 48 hours long auction on behalf of the borrower,
  • When the auction is fully funded, the borrower’s prepaid card is topped up immediately and he gets SMS notification.

The terms of SMS loan contracts are predefined. The amount is 500, 1000, 2000 or 3000 PLN, interest rate is locked at 20% p.a. (interest rate cap enforced by Polish anti-usury law) and the duration of loan is limited to 12 months.

The prepaid MasterCard  is issued by Bank BZ WBK  (owned in 70% by Allied Irish Bank). It is equipped with PayPass technology enabling contactless transactions at the point of sale.

Polish P2P Lending Site Monetto Goes Under

Michal Kisiel

In e-mail newsletter sent to its users on January 20th the operator of Polish peer-to-peer lending site Monetto.pl informed that the website will be accessible only until the end of February. Lenders are urged to update the loan contracts and to change the number of bank account set up for repayments. Monetto will no longer intermediate in processing repayments and loans should be repaid to lenders’ accounts directly.

Monetto was one of the early entrants to Polish social lending market. The company was financially backed by venture capital fund IIF. From the beginning the market was plagued by the influx of unfair borrowers, partly due to the insufficient verification procedures. Lukasz Banach, CEO of Prender Ltd. – the company behind Monetto project, reflected in the interview for finnovation.pl in September 2009, that what attracted crooks might be higher (than on other P2P lending markets in Poland) initial limit of loan amount. He also said: “In USA, UK (also Germany) there are central, accessible and trustworthy databases of credit history. As long as there is no such thing in Poland, I don’t believe that social lending will be successful here. When this barrier is removed, the percentage of bad debts on P2P markets will fall down significantly. ”

Things started to get worse in the end of 2008, when VC investor decided to stop financing the project. Since January of 2009 Monetto was in “coma” – there were no new loan listings, repayments were forwarded to lenders infrequently and there were significant problems with customer service. The investors made an effort to sell the service (although it was never announced officially) but no interested buyer was found.

The announcement is viewed by many as the last act of the drama which lasted far too long. In few articles that were published in press, the negative consequences for the credibility of social lending model in Poland are stressed. In other opinions there is a little bit of optimistic tone – failure of Monetto shows that market weeds out the weaker and less secure players.