Peer-to-peer lending platforms serve two masters. Prosper, one of the largest, made an announcement today that favors one over the other.
The San Francisco-based company raised borrower rates in an effort to attract investors amid waning confidence in the industry. Rates have increased by a weighted average of 0.29% and only impact borrowers with a Prosper rating of C or below.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Prosper had to slow its lending volume by 12% earlier this year due to lack of lender funds. Today’s move is an effort to maintain the critical balance. “The rate increase demonstrates our commitment to operating a marketplace that balances the economic incentives for both our borrower and investor communities,” states Brad Pennington, the company’s Chief Risk Officer.
This marks the second time this year Prosper raised rates (after raising them 142 basis points in February) and is stated to be in an effort to keep up with the Fed, who is anticipated to raise rates next month, and to match the “risk-reward tradeoff of investing in newly originated loans.”
It has been a rough quarter for the marketplace lending industry and for Prosper in particular. The company lost a securitization deal with Citigroup in April and cut 28% of its staff earlier this month.* That said, Prosper has had recent successes too. In March the lending platform teamed up with HomeAdvisor to improve access to home improvement financing and bolstered its consumer-facing mobile app to appeal to rejected borrowers.
Prosper presented at FinovateSpring 2009 as well as the inaugural Finovate in 2007.
* The layoff is not as dramatic as it might seem. Prosper doubled its workforce in 2015 after acquiring BillGuard.
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