P2P lender Prosper’s valuation stands at $550m with new funding
Live long and Prosper
US peer-to-peer (P2P) lending firm Prosper has landed $50 million in a Series G funding round, writes Julie Muhn at Finovate (Banking Technology‘s sister company).
The capital comes from Hong Kong-based FinEx Asia and LPG Capital and raises the San Francisco-based company’s total equity funding to $410 million.
Prosper will use the financing to make strategic investments in the company’s platform and products. “This investment is a strong signal of confidence in our business fundamentals and the momentum we are seeing right now,” says David Kimball, CEO of Prosper Marketplace. “Over the past year, we’ve shown that we can build a sustainable business that continues to redefine the online lending experience for our borrowers and investors.”
According to Lend Academy, Prosper’s valuation is now $550 million; a 70% drop from the company’s estimated 2015 valuation of $1.87 billion. However, Lend Academy also noted that Prosper’s decline aligns with competitor Lending Club’s valuation, which experienced a share price drop of 68% since April of 2015.
Marketplace lending as a whole has experienced a downturn in the past couple of years, and Prosper had to endure a stumbling block of its own in July of this year when it shuttered its Prosper Daily app. Aimed at prospective borrowers, the app was built from Prosper’s purchase of BillGuard in 2015 for $30 million.
Despite the setbacks, Prosper reported relatively strong second quarter performance this year, with $775 million in loan originations. This represents a 32% quarter-over-quarter increase and 74% year-over-year increase. Overall, the company has facilitated more than $10 billion in consumer loans over its platform since launching in 2006.
Earlier this year, the company appointed Usama Ashraf as CFO and in November of 2016 it selected David Kimball to succeed Aaron Vermut as CEO.
