OPEN BANKING FINALLY TAKES OFF
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Benefits for lenders amid Covid-19
ENGAGING WITH ADVISERS
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Property Bridges’ David Jelly talks to P2PFN
Will IFAs ever come round to P2P?
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ISSUE 47 | AUGUST 2020
P2P lenders halt CBILS applications SEVERAL peer-to-peer lending platforms that wanted to take part in the coronavirus business interruption loan scheme (CBILS) have halted their applications, amid concerns of an uneven playing field between banks and non-bank lenders. Only four P2P lenders – Funding Circle, Assetz Capital, Folk2Folk and LendingCrowd – have been accredited to the emergency scheme, which is 80 per cent government guaranteed and provides loans from £50,000 to £5m. Lee Birkett, founder of JustUs, said the platform paused its CBILS applica-
tion after reports emerged that alternative lenders had been excluded from indirectly accessing Bank of England funding. Non-bank lenders cannot access the Bank of England’s Term Funding Scheme, which offers four-year funding at or very close to the base rate
to encourage lending. A report last month in The Sunday Times said that high street banks had blocked proposals to allow alternative lenders to have access to the scheme during the pandemic. “We were always pushing for direct funding from the Bank of Eng-
land,” said Birkett. “At the moment, the only lenders with the balance sheet to lend at scale are the banks, so there’s no point going live with £20m when we were going to have demand for a billion. We may revisit this if the government changes its policy.” David Bradley-Ward, chief executive of assetbacked P2P lender Ablrate, said he wanted his platform to be accredited for CBILS but doesn’t believe this will happen. As the scheme ends on 30 September, the British Business Bank (BBB) is more likely to focus on larger lenders that >> 4
P2P lenders question Defaqto ratings PEER-TO-PEER lenders have questioned the fairness and accuracy of financial product review website Defaqto’s star rating system. A number of P2P lenders have queried why they have been given low ratings when they have
had little contact with the website. Defaqto reviews and rates a range of financial products including P2P lenders, to help consumers decide where to put their money, and gives each one a star rating out of five. It has rated 23 P2P
lenders, with platforms such as RateSetter and Assetz Capital awarded five stars, but other P2P firms only have one or two. P2P pawnbroker Unbolted has one star but its co-founder Rito Haldar told Peer2Peer Finance News that this seems
misleading to investors as it does not mirror its performance or customer feedback. “I have no idea why we have one star from Defaqto and do not recollect having any conversations with them about this,” >> 4 Haldar said.