Leeds City Council are going to begin lending to regional businesses on our peer-to-business lending platform. By lending alongside the crowd, the council will demonstrate their support of small- and medium-sized businesses in the region.
Leeds City Council (LCC) has been proactive recently in promoting the FinTech sector, and supports and sponsors the monthly FinTech North Friday seminars which take place in Leeds on a monthly basis. This new collaboration with rebuildingsociety.com forms part of the council’s ongoing regional economic growth strategy.
The team at the council will review business loan requests from companies with an LS postcode prefix, consider the industry and location of the company, and contribute to the loan amounts required by suitable applicants. Council representatives will review the performance of their portfolio on a quarterly basis to evaluate the efficacy of the capital committed, as part of the council’s broader, macroeconomic objectives.
The focus of traditional finance sector on maximising short-term returns often leads to a misallocation of financial resource. This in turns means that central government must allocate funding for specific initiatives of economic stimulation, while simultaneously committing to deliver a return.
Daniel Rajkumar, rebuildingsociety.com Founder and Managing Director, believes the proposal will provide great financial support to the area. "There is no need to rely on London for local funding needs. By arranging finance online and locally, regions can prosper and go on to further support local communities."
Simon Brereton, Acting Head of Economic Policy and Sector Development at Leeds City Council, commented: “This is the first public sector organisation to be investing through rebuildingsociety.com. We hope it will attract the interest of other public-sector lenders, as well as prospective borrowers.”
