Social Lending: A Pannel Discussion

Date: December 05, 2007

Location:Palo Alto

"Social Lending: A Pannel Discussion" MIT Club of Northern California. Before banks even existed, getting a loan meant going through the original social network: friends and family. Access to sufficient capital was a big problem. If friends and family are poor, then starting a business was difficult. With Web 2.0, a person's social network has a much larger and global reach: A third-world entrepreneur can get the capital to start a business, or, a recent college graduate can refinance their credit card debt to a much lower interest rate than what the bank offers. VCs have taken note of this trend: Prosper has already received $40M of investment, Lending Club, which got its start as a Facebook application, had a $10M round of funding this year, and CircleLending was just recently acquired by Virgin. Compared to the overall lending market, these amounts are quite small, but they may also be the first drops in a torrent to come. See http://www.mitcnc.org/Events_Single.asp?eventID=1365

More information: http://www.mitcnc.org/Events_Single.asp?eventID=1365

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