My Isepankur Portfolio after 2 Months of Lending

wiseclerk 3 Comments

Two month ago, when p2p lending service Isepankur opened up to investors from all EU countries, I started lending there. In this post I look at the status of the portfolio I have built so far.

I have deposited 4,000 Euro (approx. 5,200 US$) over the past weeks. The account currently has 254 Euro in cash, 215 Euro waiting in bids on loans to close and the majority of 3,580 Euro is invested in loans. I invested usually between 10 and 35 Euro per loan. The average interest rate of the loans is 25% and loan terms are between 1 and 36 months with most loans running for 24 months or longer. Most of the investments were done using the automatic bidding feature: About two thirds of the loans are fully funded by automatic bids the minute they appear on the marketplace. It is therefore necessary to use the automatic bidding, or these loans will be missed investment opportunities.


Screenshot of Account Overview

Repayments

So far nearly all repayments came on time. Of the few who missed a payment date, all but two repaid the next day. Currently only one loan (10 Euro) of my portfolio is a few days overdue. One loan was fully repaid early after only one month. In December I have scheduled repayments of 149 Euro which consist of 91 Euro principal and 58 Euro interest. In January – with more loans reaching first repayment date – repayments will rise to over 250 Euro. Isepankur offers monthly and daily charts forecasting cash flow.


Screenshot of Isepankur cashflow view for my portfolio showing payment dates and amounts in December

Statistics

The portfolio management has a statistics section that daily calculates the return on investment. Continue reading →

Fundingknight Launches Auctions

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British p2c lending Fundingknight, a service facilitating p2p loans to British companies, yesterday launched auction bidding. Basic requirements for companies to be eligible to submit a loan application are:

  • The business must have at least two years trading history
  • They must be limited companies registered at companies house
  • And finally, they must be UK based businesses with a UK bank account

Fundingknight then uses the following criteria to decide if the application will be listed on the marketplace

  • Is the business well managed?
  • Is the company realistic about risk?
  • Will the business generate enough cash to repay the lenders?

Fundingknight launched in September 2012. There is no data publicly available on the loan volume to date.

Pretdunion celebrates successful first year

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French p2p lending service Prêt d’Union is very satisfied with the results of its first year’s operations, saying it funded a loan volume of 10 million Euro (approx 12.8M US$). Currently the loan volume is growing at approx. 2 million Euro per month.

In October Prêt d’Union raised the maximum loan amount from 19,500 to 30,000 Euro and introduced 2 year loan terms (adding to the existing 3, 4 and 5 year loans).

According to a study cited by Prêt d’Union 38% of the popluation in France have heard of p2p lending and when asked 20% said they would be willing to use a p2p lending service.

(Source: Company management)

The Lending Club Story

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‘The Lending Club Story‘ is the new Kindle ebook written by Peter Renton. It covers the interesting development of Lending Club from a p2p lending startup to a company that has issued 1 billion US$ p2p loans. The process is explained for new lenders and borrowers and the story of selected borrowers and lenders is shared.

Best of all: You can download it free for the next four days at Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk.

Peter Renton writes the very informative blog LendAcademy where he shares advice for Prosper and Lending Club lenders.

How to Lend at Isepankur – Step by Step Guide

wiseclerk 1 Comment

Recently, p2p lending service Isepankur opened to international lenders. Residents from any European Union country and Switzerland can now sign up and start investing. There are no fees for lenders. I wanted to gain first hand experience as soon as possible so I signed up immediately and now share the process.

Getting started – Registration

Registration takes place completely online. First click on ‘Join for free’ and choose a username and a password. Isepankur now sends an verification email. After confirming that, there is a form where the personal details are entered. Also choose between confirming bids via password or mobile ID.

Depositing funds

Depositing funds is done via SEPA bank transfer. For transfers done in Euro this does cost the same bank fee as a domestic bank transfer – in my case it was free. I transferred 1,000 Euro in and the amount was credited to my account the next day.
Before investing is possible, Isepankur needs to confirm the identity of the lender. That was completed the same day the money arrived, and I was ready to start investing.

First investment

Isepankur uses an auction model, where individual p2p loan applications are listed. Lenders can either manually bid or use investment profiles for automatic bidding. Under ‘Invest’, ‘Investment Opportunities’ is the list of open loan auction. There are two different types: those that close immediately once 100% funded and those that continue to run until the auction time ends with investors underbidding each other’s interest rates once 100% funding is reached.

By clicking on a loan listing, the detail information can be reviewed. Isepankur only allows fully employed borrowers on the marketplace and checks their income and credit history.


Sample of the detail information on the loan application. Lists age, type of employment, length of employment, education level and home ownership.


Sample of the detail information on the loan application. The borrower has an income of 775 Euro and existing liabilities of 165 Euro per month. Continue reading →