UK peer-to-peer lender Zopa expects to top 1 billion pounds in loans this year
By Matt Scuffham
LONDON (Reuters) - British peer-to-peer lender Zopa has organised more than 750 million pounds ($1.1 billion) in lending since it was launched ten years ago and expects to hit the 1 billion pound mark this summer, it said on Saturday.
Zopa became the first peer-to-peer lender in Britain when it launched in 2005, acting as an online broker between individuals looking to borrow or lend. Several others have opened for business since, including Funding Circle and RateSetter.
Peer-to-peer lenders have become popular among British private investors looking to make more from their money than they could from savings accounts at banks, which are offering lacklustre returns as a result of record-low interest rates.
Zopa said more than 46 million pounds in interest had been returned to 58,000 lenders since its launch and the overall return for lenders during that time was 70 percent, better Britain's housing market.
The idea for Zopa came out of a brainstorming session in a barn at the home of one of its co-founders in Buckinghamshire, England.
"We created Zopa because we saw the potential to bring people together over the internet without having to go through a bank," said chief executive and co-founder Giles Andrews.
The business has delivered an average annual rate of return of 5.6 percent after fees and losses from bad debts over the past ten years and 10,000 pounds invested in Zopa at its launch would be worth 17,000 pounds today, the company said.
Over 107,000 individuals had been approved to borrow money for events such as car purchases, home improvements, weddings and consolidating existing loans, it said.
($1 = 0.6637 pounds)
(Editing by Mark Potter)
