Website changes
Noteworthy news from the crowdlending world
Like last months, several pieces of news are related to compliance with new regulations. Indeed, both Mintos and ViaInvest switched to regulated investments… and the least we can say is that investors are overall not pleased by the changes.
Other noteworthy news include Robocash’s financial report for Q1 and new interest rates and Peerberry’s new shareholders.
Mintos
Mintos switched to notes last month. The move left many investors angry, as the secondary market for non-regulated loans is now closed. Introduction of a 20% withholding tax is also heavily criticized.
On a more positive note, Mintos seems to be taking a harder stance towards originators with a large volume of pending payments. It’s the case for CreditStar (Lendermarket‘s main loan originator) and IDF Eurasia.
CreditStar’s debt was restructured and will be paid by December, 31st. In exchange for this restructuring, interest rates for impacted loans will be increased to 18% and investors will get a 1% bonus of the rolled-over amount.
When it comes to IDF Eurasia, a partial repayment is expected in three steps. In addition, pending payments now yield 1.4x the original interest rate agreed to applies to Notes investments.
PeerBerry
Aventus Group’s CEO Andrejus Trofimovas now has a 50% stake in PeerBerry, after acquiring shares from former owner Igoris Trofimovas. It’s kind of a return to PeerBerry’s initial situation, as the platform was initially funded by Aventus Group in order to fund the growth of their loans portfolio.
Robocash
Robocash Group has a new CEO. From now on, Natalya Ischenko will replace Sergey Sedov – who will however keep his position as Chairman of the board as well as Robocash platform CEO -. In addition, CFO Grigorii Shikunov will be replaced by the current Deputy CFO Ivan Adamovich. I expect neither of these changes to have much impact on the company’s strategy or upcoming financial results.
The platform has also released their financial figures for H12022 and they’re nothing short of excellent. After a very bad first quarter where the group barely turned a profit, they managed to revert the trend and ended up with a profit close to fourteen million dollars for H12022. It’s roughly the same level as for the first semester of 2021, which saw a profit slightly above fifteen million dollars ! These figures are extremely encouraging and confirm the platform’s reliability.
Finally, interest rates will overall be reduced starting on August, 24th. Very-short term loans now only yield 8%, while it’s necessary to invest in loans longer than two years to get 13% interest rates. My personal preference goes to 12% for loans when investing for 6 months to one year, which is still an excellent deal !
ViaInvest
ViaInvest‘s switch to ABS (asset-backed securities) was supposed to happen on July, 1st. However, six weeks later it still isn’t completed. The botched-up transition has lead to a rather insane amount of complains from investors – and rightfully so -. Among them, the messed-up account balance (mine still isn’t fixed) and the removal of the buyback option for older credit lines. Communication from the platform has been basically non-existent, and it’s likely that this failed move to ABS has shattered investors’ trust for a long time.
Individual platform performance
The performance for most portfolios remained amazingly stable in the last months, in spite of the war in Ukraine and worsened economy.
Lendermarket
14.55%
The performance of my Lendermarket portfolio decreased slightly in June – it’s the first time since many month that it stands below 14% -. It’s still an excellent result; however, investing in CreditStar loans remains a bumpy ride.
To be fair, although Mintos investors saw a large increase in pending payments from CreditStar, the amount of drama in Lendermarket’s Telegram channel has noticeably decreased. CreditStar’s latest financial statements didn’t get many comments, and the conditions for the most recent cashback campaigns were acknowledged as being less restrictive than the previous ones.
Afranga
12.98%
In spite of the recurring cash drags at Afranga, the returns for this portfolio stand around 13%, which is excellent. I’ve configured my auto-invest to invest more than usual in a single loan (up to €100 instead of the usual €10), which greatly helped having more funds invested.
Robocash
12.78%
In spite of the interest rates variations, the returns of my Robocash portfolio are amazingly stable.
Esketit
12.64%
As I stopped investing in loans from Jordan, the performance for my Esketit portfolio isn’t as high as it used to. However, I’m very satisfied with getting 12% from a reliable originator and don’t want to take extra risks for 2% additional returns.
Mintos
12.12%
The performance for my Mintos portfolio still manages to stand above 12%. However, with half of my portfolio in recovery thanks to Wowwo, it’s unlikely to stay at this level.
ViaInvest
11.68%
As ViaInvest‘s botched-up migration to ABS caused balances to be unreliable, I’m not 100% sure the performance for this portfolio is accurate. It however seems to be in line with the previous months’ results.
PeerBerry
10.71%
My PeerBerry returns are overall lower than for most competitors. Still, I can only praise the fact that regular repayments are made for loans from Russia and Ukraine. Overall, roughly half of the Ukrainian loans were reimbursed, as well as 30% of the Russian ones.
Moncera
10.5%
I’m always surprised to see that the XIRR for my Moncera portfolio stands above 10%. Indeed, most loans on the platform are currently single-digit – although it’s possible to catch higher interest rates from time to time using auto-invest -.
Lande
10.18%
Returns for my Lande portfolio finally crossed the 10% mark. I like the platform more and more, as it provides a large volume of loans and great returns. It performs better than HeavyFinance, and is also much more pleasant to use.
EstateGuru
8.27%
Once again, the performance of my EstateGuru portfolio has slightly decreased. This downtrend is mostly caused by German projects, as many are delayed or defaulted. To my great surprise, I managed to sell two late German projects with only a tiny discount. I will try to get rid of the other ones, and keep on investing only in loans from Estonia and Latvia.
ReInvest24
8.03%
In spite of uncertainties regarding the geopolitical situation in Moldova, my ReInvest24 portfolio is still doing well.
BulkEstate
7.95%
Delays are starting to pile up at BulkEstate, and the performance of this portfolio stopped increasing. The platform is currently looking for a marketing manager, as Baiba is about to leave the platform. One can only hope that communication will improve once the position gets filled !
HeavyFinance
6.91%
My portfolio at HeavyFinance keeps on under-performing compared to Lande – not to mention the inferior ergonomics and weird translations -.
Global portfolio performance
4.02%
I’ve written off the tiny amount remaining at TFGCrowd. I expect additional losses at Crowdestor, Viventor as well as at Mintos but they’re currently hard to quantity.
Current allocation
My allocation hasn’t changed much. However, I’m in the process of selling physical real-estate as I’m fed up with handling rentals. I will mostly reinvest the funds in REITs, but also on the stock-exchange and will also grow my P2P portfolio again. I thus expect that the allocation in my P2P portfolio will look much different next year.
Please note that, for readability’s sake, platforms which account for less than 1% of the portfolio are grouped in the “Other” slice.
New platforms
I didn’t open any new portfolio this year, and I don’t expect to do so in the near future unless some new originator’s platform pops up.