To £3.2bn And Beyond: Alternative Finance Grows By 84%

AltFi Growth 2015

David Prosser reports in Forbes on alternative finance’s impressive 2015 figures. David, who profiled Money&Co.’s CEO, Nicola Horlick last year, has had sight of the first of five reports being published by the Cambridge Judge Business School. Crowdfundinsider has also got wind of the figures. An extended excerpt from the Forbes article is reproduced here.

 ForbesLogo

“Another year, another impressive leap forward for the UK’s alternative finance sector. It grew by 84 per cent during 2015, new research published today reveals, with loans, donations and investments funded by the industry reaching £3.2bn last year.

“The study is jointly published by the Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance and Nesta, the innovation charity, and represents the most authoritative review of the progress made by the UK’s rapidly maturing alternative finance sector. This is an industry that ‘recorded substantive expansion across almost all models’, the report concludes.

“The fastest growing of these models, albeit from a low base, is donation-based crowdfunding, which saw a 500 per cent increase in the amount raised last year, to £12m. But less niche areas are growing rapidly too. Equity-based crowdfunding, for example, raised £332m during 2015, a 295 per cent increase on the previous year.

“Still, the alternative finance market remains dominated by the peer-to-peer lending platforms – both to consumers and to businesses – which are more mature business models. This is one reason why the sector’s total growth did slow last year – that 84 per cent acceleration compares to a growth rate of 161 per cent over the course of 2014.

“Nevertheless, the continuing development of alternative finance is giving the industry increasing influence. For example, more than 3 per cent of all lending to small and medium-sized enterprises in the UK last year came from one of the sector’s platforms – amongst the smallest businesses, with turnover of less than £1m a year, this figure rises to 13 per cent.

“The industry is also attracting increasing interest from institutional investors, which have launched funds in order to capitalise on the sector’s platforms, or invested direct. The Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance and Nesta said 32 per cent of loans to consumers were funded by institutional investors last year, while 26 per cent of business lending came from this source.”

M&CLogo

Potential lenders should be mindful of the risks associated with P2P (see FAQs) as well as the good returns to be had:See here the latest of several article (links to earlier pieces are embedded in this one). Our lenders have achieved an average gross return of over 9 per cent since we began facilitating loans in April 2014.

Entrepreneurs and SMEs looking to borrow from Money&Co. should click here. Facts and tips about crowdfunding in general are available by reading our knowledge hub, here.

To learn more about getting good returns on capital potential lenders should click here. Remember, when lending your capital is at risk – please read the warnings on our Home, Lend and Frequently Asked Questions pages.



FOLLOW MONEY&CO. ON TWITTER

Search news

You may put double quotes around your search to search for literals. Max. 4 words inside quotes (dashed words count as one word).

Allowed symbols: " ' & -

More from news

Disclaimer: Money&Co.™ is the trading name of Denmark Square Limited, Company Number 08561817, registered in England & Wales, authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). The company is identified on the Financial Services Register under Reference Number 727325. The registered office is 58 Glentham Road, Barnes, London, SW13 9JJ where the register of Directors may be inspected. Denmark Square Limited (ISA manager reference number Z1932) manages the Money&Co. Innovative Finance ISA.