Assetz Capital closes £1.5m funding round with cash from the Future Fund

The peer-to-peer lender raised half the cash via a crowdfunding effort launched earlier this summer, with the other half coming from the fintech-friendly Future Fund.

Peer-to-peer lender Assetz Capital has closed a £1.5m crowdfunding round, 50 per cent of which has been covered by the Future Fund. 

Assetz Capital launched its crowdfunding effort in June 2020 and raised £750,000, which was then doubled with the help of a convertible loan from the Future Fund. 

At the time of launching the crowdfunding campaign, CEO Stuart Law told AltFi: “The Future Fund won’t be around forever. You may not get any funding if you leave it too long, so that’s why we wanted to get started straight away and instead of starting from scratch with other investors, we decided to go to our existing investor base.” 

In order to qualify for a Future Fund loan, which can range from £125,000 up to £5m and are up to 100-per-cent-backed, firms must have raised at least £250,000 in equity investment from outside investors in the last five years, and it is up to the investors to apply for the funds as opposed to the businesses. 

Stuart Law, CEO of Assetz Capital, said: “We are proud to bring the UK government into our shareholder base through the Future Fund, sitting alongside new retail investors after our latest crowdfunding round.” 

“We have our momentum back in the business again after the necessary pause for the pandemic. Covid-19 has thrown up significant challenges for all business, but we feel that we are already entering the next upcycle where we are again focused on growth and getting back to providing UK SMEs much needed capital at scale.” 

Throughout the pandemic, the fintech has facilitated over £200m Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) loans to help SMEs survive the coronavirus-related economic turmoil. 

Since it was founded back in 2013, Assetz Capital has lent over £1bn and, with the reopening of its retail lending, marked last week with a £1m residential bridging loan, the alternative lender hopes to lend its next billion by the end of 2022.