Funding Circle to upgrade lending tools

The option to manually choose which businesses to lend to and which loan parts to sell will be withdrawn.

Investors will also be able to choose one of two new lending options based on their personal preference.

Both options will be available as a Funding Circle Isa, which is due to be launched later this tax year.

The two new lending options are:

• Balanced: the investor will automatically lend to the full range of creditworthy businesses (A+ to E), aiming to achieve an attractive, stable return. This will allow the investors to build a balanced portfolio similar to the make-up of small businesses in the UK today. The project return is estimated to be 7.5% per year after fees and bad debt.
• Conservative: the investor will focus on lending to businesses that have been assessed as lower risk (initially A+/A), but with a lower projected return. The projected return is estimated to be 4.8% per year after fees and bad debt.

Funding Circle has also said that it will be introducing new interest rates at which investors can lend to businesses on 30^th August.

“There’s something we do at Funding Circle which is very hard to replicate,” said Darryl Bowman, CMO at Funding Circle (pictured above).

“There’s a spirit that drives everyone here and it’s the same spirit that drives businesses to turn their passions into a reality and investors to make their money work harder.

“We are hugely passionate about helping thousands more businesses and investors across the world and today’s rebrand is the next step on this journey.”

Since 2010, Funding Circle has financed the growth of 32,000 small businesses with 69,000 investors supporting their future through the crowdfunding platform.

Earlier this year, the lender was granted full authorisation from the FCA.