Michelle Mone resigns from board of her “beloved Ultimo” August 18, 2015 Entrepreneur Michelle Mone posted a sentimental farewell to her “beloved Ultimo” on Twitter today, following her resignation from the board of the company she founded almost 20 years ago. Read more: Michelle Mone hits back at Katie Hopkins’ ‘asylum seeker’ slam She said it was time for the lingerie and swimwear brand to “flourish” [...]
New peer-to-peer payment app Square Cash lets you transfer money to your friends using Apple Watch August 18, 2015 Next time you’re splitting a restaurant bill or paying your mate back for a shared Uber ride, there’s no need to reach for your wallet to pay anything. Or even reach for your phone, for that matter. You can now send your friends money directly from your wrist, as new peer-to-peer payment app Square Cash [...]
Zopa becomes the first UK peer-to-peer lender to crash through £1bn of loans August 18, 2015 What a difference a decade makes. Just over 10 years after it was first launched, UK platform Zopa has become the UK's first peer-to-peer lender to crash through the £1bn loans barrier. Read more: How marketplace lending is becoming part of industry furniture You only need to look at the rapid rise of alternative lenders [...]
UK company pension deficits could not be plugged by annual salary of every UK employee August 17, 2015 The annual salary of every employee in the UK couldn't pay off the pension deficit of its private companies which has more than tripled in the last 15 years. The combined shortfall of the UK private sector's defined benefit schemes stands at around £900bn, up from £250bn at the start of the millennium, despite millions [...]
Becoming Mr Matchmaker: Venntro founder Ross Williams talks going mobile, nature v nurture, and ginger dating August 16, 2015 A week today, Ross Williams will be a married man. “Oh, I’m not stressed, nervous, anxious, oh no,” he laughs. But Williams shouldn’t worry – after all, he’s got a wife and mother-in-law-to-be who are “absolutely fantastic” organisers, and his relationship was founded on a very firm footing: he and his fiancée met on an [...]
Investec Comment: Why UK investors have warmed to tech firms August 16, 2015 London has all the ingredients to remain an attractive location for technology companies to grow and seek investment. The capital has thriving public markets that have warmed to tech stocks. More and more VCs are putting money into London startups. There’s a greater number of incubators and accelerator programmes around. UK investors have also [...]
Crowdfunding platform set up to help students August 14, 2015 A FINANCIAL technology start-up is attempting to revolutionise student finance by dramatically reducing the cost of student loans. EdAid, which, pending approval by the Financial Conduct Authority, will launch in September, and is offering prospective students an alternative to government loans through a digital crowdfunding platform. Under the programme, the loans will be repaid at [...]
How businesses are using crowdfunding in their CSR strategy: The evolving relationship between platforms and corporates August 13, 2015 Crowdfunding has democratised investing and made it more efficient. But the landscape has evolved significantly. Once dominated by platforms simply enabling people to make donations to causes, debt-based crowdfunding is now by far the largest subsector, and fashionable equity gets a lot of airtime. But despite less exposure these days, the original donation-based crowdfunding is [...]
Are old-school financial services running scared of peer-to-peer? Or do they just not understand it? August 11, 2015 I was heartened recently to read the chief executive of Bibby Financial Services – what I would call an old-school financial services company – warning of a ‘bubble’ in peer-to-peer lending. As the co-founder and chief executive of one of Europe’s largest peer-to-peer lenders, I knew this warning meant one of two things; either the [...]
Annuities heavyweights Just Retirement and Partnership Assurance unveil £670m merger as pension changes bite August 11, 2015 Annuities giant Just Retirement has announced it is buying Partnership Assurance in a £670m all-share merger, after massive changes to the UK's pension regime caused sales of annuities to plummet. Shares in Just Retirement rose 1.66 per cent to 202p in early trading, while Partnership's shares jumped 8.9 per cent to 168p on the announcement [...]
