There has been quite the discussion brewing over on the Lend Academy Forum about a recent change from Lending Club. I think it’s important to point out this recent change as they affect some of the third party tools that I feature on the blog. In a nutshell, the change is that instead of tools being able to constantly get up-to-date data from the CSV file right at release time, it is now only updated once every minute. For those that don’t know what a CSV file is, it is simply a text file which includes organized data - in this case all of the available loans. You can read other forum member’s thoughts here. What does this mean for third party tools? In the case of P2P-Picks - a lot.
Penny Notes: A Detailed Look at an Innovative Strategy for Lending Club FOLIOfn Investors
Note: This is a guest post from New Jersey Guy, who currently only invests through FOLIOfn - the secondary market for Lending Club. He implements several FOLIOfn strategies, some of which he outlined in his last posts (4 part series) on Peer & Social Lending. This is a continuation of the post from Lend Academy about his penny note strategy. Below New Jersey Guy gives a little more detail into this particular strategy. Please keep in mind that this information is not investment advice, just the opinion and perspective of one investor. Thanks to New Jersey Guy for another fantastic guest post!
Q & A with NoteX360 - Execution Services for the Alternative Lending Market
I reached out to Simon Hermiz who is the co-founder and CEO of NoteX360 to learn more about their offerings. The easiest way to understand NoteX360 is that they are an aggregator and execution provider for the alternative lending market. Thus, family offices and institutional investors come to them with credit models and filter strategies. NoteX360 executes on behalf of clients using their low latency ordering management system. [Read more...]
Prosper Automated Investing with Nickel Steamroller
I recently got to a point financially where I was comfortable investing with Prosper. I wanted to be able to compare the two platforms as well as diversify my peer to peer lending investments across both Lending Club and Prosper. As an added bonus, you get to follow along as I report on my returns and learn how I invest with Prosper. Since I have no interest in hand selecting loans, it was a no brainer for me to automate with Nickel Steamroller - which is currently free. If you’re interested in automating your investing with Nickel Steamroller, please be sure to contact them and let them know I sent you. They also offer automation with Lending Club and in my opinion are the number one resource for peer to peer lending analytics. In my next post, I plan to outline more in detail my thoughts on investing with Prosper, but for now here is my latest video on automating my Prosper investing with Nickel Steamroller!
You can check out and subscribe to the Peer & Social Lending YouTube channel here
Lending Club Automated Investing vs. Third Party Automation
Last week, Lending Club announced that their form of automation formerly known as Lending Club Prime is now simply called “Automated Investing.” I’ll start by stating that I have never used Lending Club Prime or their version of Automated Investing. However, I think it is important to write about the major differences are between Lending Club’s Automated service and the third party tools that I have used. I encourage you to share your thoughts in the comments if I have missed or overlooked anything.
My Experience at LendIt 2014
#LendIt2014 swag
I recently got back from my trip to San Francisco for LendIt 2014. It was my first trip to California and I enjoyed everything about my visit. I first have to thank Peter and his team at Lend Academy and LendIt for the opportunity. Without their generosity to allow me to volunteer, it wouldn’t have been feasible for me to attend. Enthusiasm filled both rooms at the Hilton over the course of the two days. It is incredible to think how far the industry has come since I started following it last year. [Read more...]
Announcing Peer & Social Lending Press - a new addition to the family!
Today I am excited to launch a new part of Peer & Social Lending called Peer & Social Lending Press. The idea came from the many news and press releases that I receive via email from companies in the industry. This information isn’t the best fit for this blog, but it certainly deserves attention. In my mind, there needs to be a central location where these news stories are posted and I hope that is what Peer & Social Lending Press will become. Content will cover a broader range than this site and will feature all of the major players in the peer to peer lending industry. Keep an eye out on the new site as well as twitter for when press releases are posted.
Check out the new site here:
From the Peer And Social Lending Mailbox – #2
As the blog continues to gain readership, I often get questions from the contact form. We all know that there is no such thing as a stupid question. Folks also seem to have similar questions - so what better way to spread the word about peer to peer lending than to post my responses on the blog. I enjoy hearing from others and it often gives me a different perspective on things. With this industry still being relatively new, people are at all different levels as far as educating themselves and I need to keep this in mind. I hope you enjoy these posts as much as I enjoy hearing from readers. Let’s get started! [Read more...]
My P2P Lending Returns (13.87%) - Lending Club April 2014
Kick back and enjoy the returns!
It has been awhile since I’ve had a post outlining my returns with p2p lending and my plan is to be more consistent with these posts in the future. I want to preface this with the fact that my Lending Club notes are still not seasoned which means my returns below are not an accurate representation of what they will be. In fact, I have seen little progress in the average age of my notes as I continue to add funds to my account. [Read more...]
Overview of Red Rock Assets - Social Lending for Mining Projects
When it comes to social lending, I thought I had a pretty good idea of where I thought the industry could go and some of the other niches that social lending companies could service. Last week that changed when I heard about Red Rock Assets. It seems like there is no lack of innovation when it comes to disrupting industries. Red Rock Assets has an interesting twist on social lending. For one, it offers only mining projects through its platform. Not only do lenders earn interest, but there is also a profit sharing aspect, which is a unique concept. Intrigued? I was, and that’s why I was anxious to talk with Matthew Freedman - CEO of Red Rock Assets - to learn more.
[Read more...]