Singapore based peer to peer lending platform MoolahSense curates the companies that seek funding on its platform. CEO and founder Lawrence Yong recently explained the MoolahSense approach while visiting the studios of CNBC Asia during a segment of The Tech Call. The platform made its debut with an over-subscription by investors for its first offer. MoolahSense is the first P2P lending site to be fully compliant in Singapore.
Yong is asked if companies raising capital on MoolahSense are higher risk – since they are not going the “traditional” route to raise capital. Yong counters by saying the market is underserved and the SME space is the engine of the economy (just like in other countries around the world). MoolahSense’s first offer, Smaths Consulting, priced (using an auction model) at 9.9% raising S$ 100,000 with the support of 44 individual investors. Yong states this is probably less than an interest rate a bank would offer – and was significantly less than what the company originally expected to pay (18%).
The next funding campaign is scheduled to launch on January 15th.
Watch the video embedded below.