Type Joint stock company Area served Europe Founded 2015 | Headquarters Riga, Latvia Website www.mintos.com Number of employees 23 | |
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Industry Financial technology, Peer-to-peer lending Founder Martins Sulte, Martins Valters | ||
Peer-to-peer lending marketplace Mintos is a financial technology company that began operations in January 2015. Mintos brings together investors and non-bank loan originators, providing the opportunity for both private individuals and institutional investors to invest in loans originated by loan originators.
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As of November 2016, the platform has more than 15,000 registered investors from more than 50 countries, underlining that through Mintos loans an amount of EUR 88,6 million has been funded. Investments can be done from as low as EUR 10.
History
Mintos team started to work on the idea in mid 2014 and launched the platform in January 2015. More than €250 000 had been invested in secure loans through Mintos P2P lending platform in the first week.
The investor numbers have risen from 2,000 to more than 12,000 within 12 months, thus creating a solid investor base that outperforms other long-established platforms. Mintos’ growth has also driven the development of the industry itself; for many investors, the Mintos marketplace has been their first experience with peer-to-peer lending.
In March 2015 Mintos starts offering investors an opportunity to invest in loans secured by a vehicle that are originated and serviced by Mogo in Estonia.
In May 2015 Mintos introduced buy-back guarantee to the investors, first of its kind in the industry. The buy-back guarantee means that in case the loan becomes delinquent for more than 60 days, it is repurchased from investor at principal value plus accrued interest, as a result the investor does not bear default risk.
In May 2015 Mintos starts offering secured car loans in Lithuania that are provided to consumers in cooperation with Mogo, market leading car loan provider in the region.
In June 2015 Mintos co-founded the Crowdfunding Association of Latvia.
In July 2015 Capitalia joins the Mintos lending marketplace. Loans issued by Capitalia are available on Mintos marketplace and an investor can invest in small and medium enterprises in Latvia and Lithuania.
Mintos is planning to move the platform to the UK and submit it to Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) regulatory supervision. The decision was made due to the fact that the UK, and London in particular, is the world’s largest centre for FinTech.
In September 2015 Creamfinance joins the Mintos platform. Unsecured short-term loans, originated by Creamfinance in Georgia with the CreditON brand, are available for investment on the platform. By reaching an agreement with the non-bank lender Creamfinance, the peer-to-peer lending platform Mintos has expanded investment opportunities by offering investors the opportunity to invest in short-term unsecured loans issued in Georgia.
Since the start of 2016 the Mintos marketplace hosts 14 new loans from loan originators, representing countries such as the Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland.
In 2016 Mintos secured cooperation with 3 Lithuanian loan originators. Out of the three the first being DEBIFO, which provides services for invoice financing to small as well as medium enterprises with sustaining their invoices (i.e. accounts receivables) as collateral. The other two - credit union Mano Unija, which focuses on business loans and Kredito Garantas, which places private mortgage loans on the Mintos marketplace.
Similarly to Lithuania, Mintos began its cooperation with 3 Latvian loan originators in 2016. The first, by the name of Banknote offers personalized loans, international bank transfers, as well as secured loans using personal property as collateral. Second – WestKredit, which hands out loans to both businesses and private individuals against real estate collateral and the third being AgroCredit which issues farmers loans and secures them with a grain-supply contract.
Thereafter in 2016 Mintos added a Czech loan issuer by the name of ACEMA, thereby offering investors far more geographically wider investment opportunities. At the time cooperation was established with the Polish loan originator Aforti Finance, which lends to small- and medium-sized businesses in Poland.
Since July 2016 Georgian loan originator Lendo offers short-term, uninsured loans on the Mintos marketplace.
An Estonian non-bank loan department by the name of Creditstar joined in 2016 and is kicking off its cooperation with Mintos by adding loans granted in Poland to its marketplace.
Since September 2016 Aventus Group has joined the Mintos platform. Aventus Group issues short-term unsecured loans in the Czech Republic, Georgia, Latvia and Poland.
Also in the beginning of the year 2016 Mintos announced that it has closed its seed funding round, which attracted €2 million from Skillion Ventures, a venture capital firm based in Riga. A year and a half since beginning its operations, peer-to-peer lending marketplace Mintos has witnessed investors funding already more than EUR 50 million in loans to both private individuals, as well as small and medium-sized businesses.
Business model
Mintos has fundamentally transformed the concept of peer-to-peer lending by introducing a new business model. If a traditional peer-to-peer lending platform connects investors with borrowers, then, by connecting investors with borrowers of a number of loan originators, Mintos has created a brand new concept — peer-to-peer lending 2.0 — that takes the whole industry in a new direction.
Mintos has created a liquid loans marketplace where investors can satisfy their appetite for any kind of risk-return ratio, while loan originators can easily sell their loans on the marketplace. It is a win-win situation for all involved parties. Investors have access to much broader investment opportunities as part of a single platform, both in geographic terms, and in terms of different loan types originated by various loan originators. With the Mintos marketplace, investors can significantly diversify their investment portfolio and consequently spread risk. On the other hand, loan originators do not have to invest in complex technological solutions and marketing to establish their own platforms. Consequently, borrowers can get access to cheaper loans.
Investors
Loan types on the Mintos marketplace: agricultural loans, invoice financing, mortgage loans, secured car loans, small business loans and unsecured loans.
The Mintos marketplace is used by investors from 50 countries across the globe, including Japan, Australia, Singapore, Sweden, Finland, and others; however, the most active investors are from Germany, Estonia, Latvia, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom. Total number of investors as of November 2016 is 14,667.
Returns to investors
So far the average net annual return for investors investing via the Mintos platform have been slightly below 13%, but it can vary for different investors because of diverse opportunities to complement their own investment portfolio.
Recognitions
Mintos won the title of the best startup in Rietumu FinTech Challenge organized by TechHub Riga and Rietumu banka in 2015.
Mintos has been selected as the runner up for The One to Watch award presented by AltFi Awards 2015.
At the end of year 2015 Mintos was listed between nominees for the European FinTech Award 2016.
Other activities
Mintos was one of the sponsors and took part in one of the largest peer-to-peer lending conferences "LendIt Europe 2015". In "LendIt Europe 2016" Mintos took part as one of the exhibitors.
Quarterly investor webinars set up by Mintos ensure investor engagement and drive the development of the marketplace. The publicly available financial data of the marketplace — as well as detailed financial information on every loan originator — foster transparency and investor trust.