zcommodore

Since group leader fees disappeared in mid-September, I had posted a couple of times about how the number of borrowers with listings in groups had gone down quite a bit.  Well, with the recent change that allows borrowers to get second loans that trend has changed dramatically.  I had noticed that no-group listings had increased up to ~87% of all listings on Prosper.  I just checked a few minutes ago and noticed that no-group listings were down to ~76% due to all the 2nd loan requests, even from otherwise closed and/or inactive groups.

I think one of my earlier posts had a comment from someone who pointed me to a graph on wiseclerk.com that shows a graph of this activity.  You can see how in-group listings dropped dramatically in September and now are on the rise on this page.

I've noticed a lot of the requests for 2nd loans don't seem to be going anywhere.  Many of the borrowers are people who only received their first loan due to "pump & dump" support from their group leaders.  Now they may be current on their existing loan and want to come back for more but can't seem to get funded since group leaders have no incentive to pump & dump anymore.  I wonder if many of these borrowers even understand what is going on such that they are having trouble getting funded.

One more thing: keep an eye on this blog because I intend to post some interesting information I've noticed recently about lender activity later this week.