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Powering the marketplace lending ecosystem — with Matt Burton

orchard powers crowdfunding

This is the next instalment of our series on crowdfunding. You can access my other interviews on crowdfunding here and here.

Matt Burton, cofounder of the Orchard Platform joins me, Zack Miller, on the Tradestreaming Podcast.

Crowdfunding is a huge, transformative trend in investing. Both individual and institutional investors alike are turning to crowdfunding to deploy their monies.

Matt’s company, Orchard, provides the technology infrastructure of many of these new platforms (what Burton calls the “marketplace lending ecosystem”). Given his ringside seat to what’s transpiring in the p2p lending (and broader, in crowdfunding in general) industry, Matt addressed why investors are so interested in this new form of investing, how individual investors and professionals are using these crowdfunding platforms, and more.

Listen to the FULL interview

About Matt

Matt Burton is co-founder and CEO of the Orchard Platform and has spent his entire career helping build, scale, and optimize the internet’s top advertising exchanges (Google, Admeld, LiveRail).

More resources

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Get off the investment roller coaster by getting the Lending Club gospel

Lending Club produced a nice new video I liked and thought you’d appreciate seeing.

In 5 years, the firm has underwritten over $1B in peer-to-peer loans and is on fire. As I’ve written before, I believe the direct personal loan is on its way to becoming a new asset class in investor portfolios, thanks to Lending Club.

Additional resources

  • Listen to my interview with Lending Club founder and CEO, Renaud Laplanche

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Investing in people with peer to peer loans – with Lending Club’s Renaud Laplanche

Lending Club's Renaud Laplanche on marketplace lending

I have to admit: investing in peer to peer loans didn’t initially appeal to me.

I thought it would be hard to assess the risk in lending to individuals — after all, that’s what banks get paid the big bucks for, right?

But 5 years after Lending Club first launched its website, the firm has pioneered a whole industry, not just to say a new asset class. There have been over $1B in p2p loans underwritten and investors like me are now using p2p loans as a core holding in the fixed income part of their portfolios.

Founder Renaud Laplanche joins me on Tradestreaming Radio to talk about how the p2p loan industry cures some major inefficiencies in the market for capital, does a better job sizing up and personalizing risk, and how his firm and industry might just eat the banking system’s future lunch.

Listen to the FULL episode

Continue reading “Investing in people with peer to peer loans – with Lending Club’s Renaud Laplanche”

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Lending Club grabs the moola, gets Meeker

Looks like I’m not the only converted believer in the rise of peer to peer lending as an asset class…mary meeker of kleiner perkins invests in Lending Club

Lending Club, which commands about 75% of the market for p2p loans, landed a strategic investor today. Mary Meeker, formerly the technology axe for Morgan Stanley and now a partner at Kleiner Perkins (KPCB), is leading a $15M investment and will join the firm’s board.

Why is this important?

  • Lending Club has now raised over $100M
  • this brings LC’s total unrestricted cash to almost $50M
  • LC has originated over $650M in loans and is adding something like $135 million each quarter
  • it’s just a huge approbation to the viability of LC and the p2p lending industry in general

Lending Club’s CEO, Renaud Laplanche (who’s scheduled for a future episode of Tradestreaming Radio) had this to say about Meeker:

“Kleiner Perkins is virtually synonymous with breakthrough brands we love like Amazon.com, Google, and Twitter. Mary’s unique depth of experience across both the financial industry and with the Internet’s category leaders will be instrumental in Lending Club’s continued growth and mainstream adoption,” said Laplanche. “We are thrilled to welcome both Kleiner Perkins and Mary as our new partners.”

I love it when things get interesting.

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