17 Apr Remarkable IPO’s in the P2P landscape
Etsy Inc., the website founded a decade ago by a carpenter looking to sell wooden computers, nearly doubled in its trading debut after raising $267M in an initial public offering this week.
Etsy is a social enterprise and a peer-to peer marketplace of artisan-crafted handmade and vintage goods, along with art and craft supplies. As of December 31, 2014, Etsy had 54 million users registered as members and the peer-to-peer online marketplace connected 1.4 million active sellers with 19.8 million active buyers. At the end of 2014, Etsy had 685 employees, and had 29 million items listed on its website. With the raise of about $267M in capital the entire company is now valued at about $1.8B
Etsy is a certified Benefit Corporation, or B Corp, one of a growing number of companies that pledge to adhere to social and environmental accountability guidelines set by a nonprofit organization called B Lab. And Etsy on Thursday became only the second for-profit company to go public out of more than 1,000 companies with the B Corp certification.
China Peer-to-Peer Lender Yirendai Said to Plan $300M IPO
Yirendai Chinese peer-to-peer lending platform, plans to raise about $300 million in a U.S. initial public offering, people with knowledge of the matter said. (Source: Bloomberg Business)
The Beijing-based company, whose name means “convenient lending and borrowing” in Chinese, aims to list this year, according to the people. It could be valued at about $2B in the share sale, two of the people said, asking not to be identified as the information is private.
Yirendai may become be the first Chinese online-loan platform to obtain an overseas listing, following offerings last year from similar U.S. companies LendingClub Corp. and On Deck Capital Inc. The largely unregulated industry in China surged almost 13-fold since 2012 to $41B last year as the number of platforms multiplied, data compiled by Yingcan Group show.
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