Assetz Capital resumes retail lending

Peer-to-peer lender Assetz Capital has resumed retail lending, after a six-month pause due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The platform listed a £1.06m residential bridging loan for eight luxury apartments in Northern Ireland, and it was fully funded by retail lenders within two hours.

The loan is targeting an interest rates of nine per cent.

“While we’ve been very active in recent months with preparing and recently launching our coronavirus business interruption loan scheme (CBILS), this manual lending account bridging loan is an important milestone,” said Assetz Capital’s chief executive Stuart Law (pictured).

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“Retail investors are the lifeblood of our marketplace, and the uptake of this first bridging loan vindicates our decision to restart retail lending alongside institutional.

“With the possibility of negative interest rates on the horizon and a rollercoaster stock market with dividends being slashed, we still firmly believe P2P lending is a vital alternative investment class that sits well in a balanced investment portfolio.

“Not only that, but we are able to directly support small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and in turn jobs and the wider economy through this investment. We feel that investments such as ours will continue to attract a growing share of investors’ capital over years to come.”

Assetz Capital paused its retail lending operations in March, in response to the economic shock of the pandemic. In May, it became the second P2P lending platform to win CBILS authorisation.

Initially, the platform had hoped to re-open its manual lending accounts for retail investors as early as July.

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