Assetz Capital is Now Two Years Old! Taking Peer-to-Peer to the Next Level
We wanted to develop a peer-to-peer network whereby businesses could gain access to much needed funds, while investors could gain higher returns than they were currently able to achieve.
In the Beginning
We launched Assetz Capital to the public in April 2013 after building a highly experienced and professional credit team and an easy to use website and it is now our 2nd Birthday.
The whole business was underpinned by a customer service team that others in the sector did not offer at the time; the ultimate merger of sound credit management and fintech.
Most of this will resonate with those reading this blog but of course, we are always listening and encouraging feedback to make what we do more efficient, better to use and fundamentally, the best product in the sector.
With a strong property background and deep experience in property and SME lending, we have always insisted on having robust asset security in place for every loan.
Our Current Position
As a result of our structured and monitored approach to lending, Assetz Capital has grown its lending book by 300% per annum and is targeting £1billion lent by the end of our 2016/17 financial year.
During the process, businesses of all kinds have gained funding of between £100,000 and £4million, which has enabled investors to access loans offering returns of between 6.5% and 15% pa gross in the time since we launched, depending on the risk profile of the loan and before allowances for tax or any losses.
We’ve had a really strong deal flow to start 2015 too, confirming our place in the industry’s ‘Big Four’ in the peer-to-peer sector. This is recognised in our partnership with Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) to provide loans for some of their customers and US institutional investment of £150m which will be lent out to SMEs. These are the first of several big deals we expect to announce this year.
Raising growth capital is part and parcel of today’s fast-growth fintech scene, and we had always planned to do so with the help of the crowd, as our lenders also wanted to back us as a business. As a result, we’re just completing a tranche of equity capital through another leading crowdfunding platform, Seedrs.
Having democratised finance, we wanted to do the same with Assetz Capital – giving many hundreds of our investors the chance to own shares in our business. We couldn’t have lent around £70m in our first two years without you all playing a part.
Our target equity allocation for the crowd through Seedrs was £2m but was achieved within just a few days. We’ve now hit our expanded goal of £3m thanks to nearly 800 investors from across the UK, and Europe. It will allow Assetz Capital to continue to grow our team, our brand and scale up by exploring other European markets as we look to change the world of business finance for the better. We’re thrilled to now have hundreds of you joining this much needed, and appreciated, adventure.
The Next Steps
I sit here writing this as if we’ve been around for ten or twenty years, but it’s truly staggering to think that we’ve only been in existence as a business since 2013 and helped so many businesses and investors. It inspires us to continually do better and keep improving ourselves and the peer-to-peer sector.
We’re not finished by a long shot, so please do keep the feedback coming. It only makes us stronger, and collectively more successful.
- April 20, 2015