Last updated - 27 Feb 2024
Mintos lenders can default or close down - choosing the best lenders is important
In 2017, Mintos lender Eurocent failed, and defaulted on its Mintos ‘buyback guarantee’ commitments. Since then there have been defaults and issues with several other lenders. Over the last 5 years we have been providing the scores and data on this page – our Mintos lender ratings. Our goal is to provide investors with key information on each lender, and a rating score to help highlight those that are lowest and highest risk.
To begin with, below we discuss some recent events:
Mintos cuts a deal with a Russian lender - investors take a 35% loss
Mintos has announced that one of its Russian loan originators, Revo Technology, has exited the Mintos platform, following a negotiated settlement. Payments outside of Russia have been heavily limited by local authorities, which has resulted in many Mintos investors receiving either nil or minimal payments from the Russian lending groups that owe them funds.
Revo Technology presented an offer to Mintos to pay 65% of the balances owed, in return for a ‘haircut’ or write-off of the remaining 35%. Mintos says that this 35% haircut was a requirement introduced by Russian authorities to approve a bulk payment transfer (it would be interesting to know how this 35% windfall gain is being split between Revo and the Russian authorities). While taking any loss is annoying for Mintos investors, in our view this was probably the correct action to take – the alternative would have been an extremely long and uncertain time period to recover more than this amount.
One interesting outcome is that the 35% loss is being applied equally across all Mintos investors. We think this is a lot more equitable than what Mintos has done previously, where they paid out some investors in full, and wiped out others, based on the maturity dates of the loans they held. This never made sense to us and we are glad that they have changed their approach to distributing work-out recoveries.
Mintos updates its ratings
In June Mintos announced the latest updates to its ratings. The changes are not particularly significant – the score changes were fairly minor. We have updated our tables below with the new ratings.
Withholding taxes reduced from 20% to 5% - check your account status
One of the impacts of Mintos moving to a regulated notes structure was that it had to levy withholding taxes at source. This was one of the biggest downsides that we noted when in our post about the changes.
In welcome news, Mintos has announced that it has been able to reduce the withholding tax rate from 20% to 5% for EU and EEA residents. If you qualify, it is important that you make sure that you have provided any information that Mintos require to set you up on the 5% rate, and check that it is activated.
Why is the reduction good for investors? Some investors may have an effective tax rate below the 20% level, and this withholding tax deduction may reduce the amount of tax they pay overall. Even if you pay high rates of tax – the move is beneficial. That’s because more of the interest earned can get reinvested throughout any tax year, leading to higher interest income being earned after tax.
Mintos finally launches its Notes program. Forced to close secondary market
After several delays Mintos has announced that it has launched its notes program. The notes program is designed to replace the current arrangement where it sells participations in loans, and is linked to its move to become a licenced investment platform. Initially there will be 3 companies issuing notes – CashCredit, Eleving and Sun Finance Latvia. While Mintos is highlighting some benefits to investors from notes relating to protections and transparency, there seem to be several downsides. One topic that has understandably upset many investors is the imposition of withholding taxes on interest earnings for the first time. We plan to write a post that discusses this in more detail shortly. Another huge downside relates to the secondary market – Mintos is being forced to close the secondary market in claims by 30 June. While a secondary market in notes will be possible, cutting off the liquidity options for over €670 million of claims that are currently outstanding is a huge negative. We hope Mintos makes investors more aware of the situation as this detail appears to have been lost in their communications.
Check out our new post that discusses the implications for investors of the new Mintos notes scheme – the key benefits, and 4 important downsides to be aware of.
Key financial information of each Mintos lender
The table below captures the key financial information for each lender. This can be useful to quickly lookup the profile of each lender, and compare the strengths and weaknesses of each one.
All Figures in EUR million (profits annualised where appropriate):
| Loan originator | Reporting period | Loans | Equity | Profit - latest | Profit - prior year | Profit - 2 years prior | Audited? |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Eleving (Mogo) | Dec 2023 | 320 | 66 | 23.4 | 20.3 | 7.1 | ✔ |
| BB Finance | Nov 2023 | 14.7 | 5.1 | 0.4 | 0.4 | 1.5 | ✔ |
| IDF Eurasia Kazakhstan | Dec 2022 | 155 | 31.7 | 3.4 | 7.5 | 5.7 | ✔ |
| Creditstar | Sep 2023 | 244 | 57 | 6.7 | 8.9 | 7.1 | ✔ |
| Capital Service (D) | Dec 2021 | 18.7 | 1.7 | 3.6 | -3.8 | 0 | X |
| Credifiel | Sep 2023 | 81 | 43 | 7.5 | 5.4 | 1.6 | ✔ |
| IuteCredit | Dec 2023 | 232 | 63 | 10.2 | 17.1 | 6.1 | ✔ |
| ExpressCredit (D) | Dec 2020 | 20.9 | 4.5 | 0.1 | 1.4 | -1.6 | ✔ |
| DelfinGroup | Sep 2023 | 84.5 | 21 | 7.1 | 6.0 | 4.2 | ✔ |
| GoCredit | Dec 2021 | 10.3 | 8.8 | 1.5 | 1.2 | 0.32 | ✔ |
| LF Tech | Dec 2021 | 37.8 | 14.1 | 9.6 | 4.3 | ✔ | |
| Jet Finance | Dec 2022 | 4.8 | 2.2 | 0.4 | 0.8 | -1.9 | ✔ |
| Financiera Contigo / CEGE | Dec 2021 | 74.3 | 19.5 | 5.0 | 1.4 | -3.6 | ✔ |
| Conmigo Vales / CEGE | Dec 2021 | 74.3 | 19.5 | 5.0 | 1.4 | -3.6 | ✔ |
| Watu Credit Uganda | Dec 2021 | 15.8 | 1.2 | 1.6 | -0.4 | ✔ | |
| Capem | Dec 2022 | 67.3 | 17.3 | 1.4 | 1.1 | 0.7 | ✔ |
| Alivio | Dec 2021 | 11.1 | 2.0 | 0.0 | 0.1 | 0.1 | ✔ |
| Finko Dinero (D) | Dec 2019 | 11.3 | 1.0 | 1.2 | -1.5 | ✔ | |
| Finko UkrPozyka (D) | Dec 2019 | 5.0 | 1.0 | -1.7 | ✔ | ||
| SOS Credit (S) | Sep 2020 | 1.0 | 1.1 | 0.0 | 0.2 | 0.2 | X |
| Planet42 | Sep 2023 | 68 | 3.0 | -0.4 | -1.1 | 0.1 | X |
| DanaRupiah | Dec 2021 | 1.1 | 0.9 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 2.5 | ✔ |
| Monego (D) | Dec 2018 | 4.1 | 0.4 | -0.6 | 0 | ✔ | |
| Cashwagon (D) | Feb 2020 | 27.9 | 1.0 | -5.9 | -7.0 | ✔ | |
| Placet Group | Sep 2023 | 72.3 | 32.1 | 4 | 3.9 | 3.4 | ✔ |
| Fenchurch Legal (S) | May 2021 | 10.4 | 0.5 | 0.5 | X | ||
| Wowwo (D) | Sep 2021 | 24.9 | 23.7 | 3.3 | 2.0 | 1.6 | ✔ |
| Evergreen | Dec 2022 | 15.5 | 3.7 | 0.8 | 1.3 | 0.3 | X |
| Creamfinance | Dec 2021 | 35.0 | 14.7 | 3.4 | -0.8 | 0.9 | ✔ |
| Extra Finance | Dec 2018 | 4.6 | 2.0 | 0.1 | 2.0 | 2.0 | X |
| Mozipo Group | Dec 2022 | 12.2 | 5.0 | 0.2 | -0.2 | -0.3 | ✔ |
| Finitera Kredo | Dec 2019 | 10.6 | 0.2 | -1.2 | -0.8 | -0.2 | ✔ |
| Creditter (S) | Dec 2020 | 2.9 | 1.4 | 0.5 | 0.9 | ✔ | |
| Dozarplati (S) | Sep 2020 | 22.5 | 6.9 | 5.8 | 2.0 | 0.8 | X |
| EcoFinance (S) | Dec 2020 | 6.1 | 2.4 | -1.8 | -0.3 | 0.1 | ✔ |
| GFM (S) | Dec 2022 | 9.0 | 7.3 | 0.3 | 0.2 | 0.2 | X |
| Dinerito | Dec 2022 | 24.0 | 8.1 | 0.5 | 0.5 | -0.1 | ✔ |
| Hipocredit | Dec 2022 | 10.4 | 1.6 | 0.5 | 0.3 | 0.4 | ✔ |
| Debifo | Dec 2018 | 7.8 | 0.1 | -0.1 | 0.2 | 0.0 | X |
| Kviku (S) | Dec 2021 | 83.3 | 13.9 | 10.1 | 1.7 | 0.8 | X |
| Rapido (D) | Dec 2018 | 1.8 | -1.7 | -1.7 | -1.9 | -0.8 | ✔ |
| Peachy (D) | Dec 2018 | 5.7 | -1.4 | -0.4 | -2 | ✔ | |
| GetBucks (D) | Jun 2019 | 92.1 | -41.8 | -51.2 | -9.5 | -12 | ✔ |
| Finclusion | Dec 2021 | 16.7 | 12.4 | 0.4 | -0.8 | ✔ | |
| Credius | Dec 2022 | 11.4 | 11.8 | 3.1 | 3.0 | 1.7 | ✔ |
| Rapicredit | Dec 2022 | 11.7 | 2.9 | 0.7 | 0.5 | -0.6 | ✔ |
| Watu Credit | Dec 2021 | 27.9 | 4.8 | 4.5 | 1.5 | 0.2 | ✔ |
| Sun Finance Latvia | Dec 2022 | 21.6 | 11.3 | 3.9 | 7.1 | 6.9 | ✔ |
| Everest Finanse | Dec 2022 | 105.4 | 69.2 | 2.1 | 6.1 | 2.2 | ✔ |
| Sun Finance Group | Sep 2023 | 191 | 86 | 69 | 66 | 51 | ✔ |
| E-Cash (D) | Dec 2019 | 2.3 | 0.6 | -1.3 | -0.6 | X | |
| Esto | Sep 2023 | 47.7 | 12.3 | 5.5 | 3.7 | 3.3 | ✔ |
| Mikro Kapital Russia (S) | Dec 2020 | 17.7 | 7.7 | 0.3 | 0.4 | -0.3 | ✔ |
| Mikro Kapital Romania | Dec 2020 | 25.6 | 5.7 | 0.3 | -0.4 | ✔ | |
| Mikro Kapital Uzbekistan | Dec 2020 | 8.5 | 0.9 | 0.8 | -0.3 | ✔ | |
| Mikro Kapital Belarus | Sep 2020 | 31.1 | 4.9 | 1.8 | 0.8 | ✔ | |
| Mikro Kapital Moldova | Dec 2022 | 31.7 | 6.9 | 0.9 | 0.9 | 0.4 | ✔ |
| Fireof | Dec 2018 | 3.8 | 0.9 | 0.0 | X | ||
| ID Finance Spain | Dec 2022 | 63.9 | 18.7 | 10.4 | 10.5 | 2.5 | ✔ |
| Lime Zaim (S) | Jun 2021 | 13.9 | 5.1 | 1.2 | 0.0 | 1.5 | ✔ |
| Dineo Credito (S) | Dec 2021 | 7.4 | 3.0 | 1.8 | 3.3 | 2.2 | ✔ |
| Dziesiątka Finanse (D) | Dec 2019 | 9.5 | 3.4 | 0.5 | 0.2 | 0.0 | ✔ |
| Novaloans (S) | May 2021 | 5.0 | 1.8 | 0.3 | 0.3 | 0.7 | ✔ |
| Swell | Dec 2021 | 8.4 | 3.9 | 0.3 | -1.5 | 0.0 | X |
| Alex Credit (D) | Mar 2019 | 3.1 | 1.3 | 0.6 | -0.3 | X | |
| CashCredit | Dec 2022 | 7.4 | 3.2 | 0.3 | -0.1 | 0.1 | ✔ |
Note: S = Suspended D= Defaulted W = Solvent windown
Our Mintos lender ratings
Our Mintos lender ratings are based on 5 characteristics – profitability, capitalisation, size, track record and the quality of their reporting. We have allocated marks out of 20 for each metric, giving a total score out of 100. Mintos have recently changed their ratings system, which is now a number from 0-10. A W/D indicates that Mintos has withdrawn their rating.
| Lender | Status | Profit | Capital | Size | Disclosure quality | Track record | Score / 100 | Last score change | Mintos score |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Eleving (Mogo) | Active | 15 | 8 | 17 | 17 | 14 | 71 | 0 | 8.0-9.3 |
| BB Finance | Active | 10 | 11 | 11 | 14 | 12 | 58 | 7.5 | |
| IDF Eurasia Kazakhstan | Active | 11 | 10 | 15 | 12 | 9 | 57 | +6 | 5.8-6.2 |
| Placet Group | Active | 16 | 18 | 15 | 15 | 17 | 81 | 0 | 8.3 |
| Planet42 | Active | 7 | 4 | 13 | 11 | 6 | 41 | -5 | 7.4 |
| Creditstar | Active | 12 | 6 | 17 | 11 | 8 | 54 | 0 | 4.4-5.4 |
| IuteCredit | Active | 15 | 12 | 16 | 17 | 17 | 77 | 0 | 7.3-7.8 |
| ExpressCredit Botswana | Active | 9 | 5 | 10 | 6 | 0 | 30 | -3 | 8.3 |
| GoCredit | Active | 13 | 14 | 13 | 14 | 12 | 66 | 0 | 6.6 |
| LF Tech | Active | 14 | 13 | 13 | 7 | 9 | 56 | +8 | 5.8 |
| Watu Credit Uganda | Active | 13 | 7 | 11 | 10 | 7 | 48 | +7 | 7.1 |
| Capem | Active | 11 | 14 | 14 | 13 | 13 | 65 | 0 | 8.4 |
| Jet Finance | Active | 8 | 11 | 5 | 12 | 6 | 42 | 6.7 | |
| Alivio | Active | 7 | 7 | 10 | 13 | 11 | 48 | 0 | W/D |
| Financiera Contigo / CEGE | Active | 13 | 12 | 14 | 12 | 12 | 63 | 5.6 | |
| Conmigo Vales / CEGE | Active | 11 | 10 | 12 | 10 | 7 | 50 | 0 | W/D |
| DelfinGroup | Active | 17 | 16 | 14 | 18 | 17 | 82 | 0 | 8.4-8.7 |
| SOS Credit | Suspended | 6 | 10 | 4 | 7 | 11 | 38 | -8 | W/D |
| Credifiel | Active | 15 | 15 | 14 | 11 | 14 | 69 | 7.4 | |
| Creamfinance | Active | 14 | 14 | 13 | 14 | 14 | 68 | +6 | W/D |
| Extra Finance | Active | 12 | 15 | 8 | 0 | 12 | 47 | -5 | W/D |
| Mozipo Group | Active | 4 | 8 | 10 | 6 | 7 | 35 | 0 | 8.1 |
| Wowwo | Defaulted | 12 | 13 | 13 | 7 | 14 | 59 | 0 | W/D |
| Fenchurch Legal | Defaulted | 8 | 9 | 11 | 7 | 7 | 42 | W/D | |
| Rapicredit | Active | 12 | 9 | 10 | 9 | 11 | 51 | +6 | 5.3 |
| Evergreen | Active | 11 | 8 | 11 | 4 | 8 | 42 | -7 | 6.9 |
| Dozarplati | Suspended | 14 | 11 | 13 | 5 | 13 | 56 | +11 | W/D |
| Creditter | Suspended | 12 | 11 | 8 | 9 | 7 | 47 | +14 | W/D |
| EcoFinance | Suspended | 5 | 9 | 9 | 11 | 6 | 40 | +6 | W/D |
| GFM | Active | 10 | 14 | 10 | 6 | 8 | 46 | 0 | W/D |
| Hipocredit | Active | 9 | 7 | 9 | 10 | 12 | 47 | +6 | 7.9 |
| Debifo | Active | 5 | 5 | 6 | 0 | 6 | 22 | -10 | W/D |
| Finclusion | Active | 10 | 13 | 13 | 12 | 3 | 51 | +16 | 6.6 |
| Sun Finance Group | Active | 18 | 15 | 16 | 15 | 15 | 79 | 0 | 6.6 |
| Lime Zaim | Suspended | 11 | 12 | 11 | 12 | 14 | 60 | +8 | W/D |
| Fireof | Active | 7 | 7 | 5 | 0 | 10 | 29 | -14 | W/D |
| E-cash | Suspended | 0 | 2 | 5 | 8 | 5 | 20 | -3 | W/D |
| DanaRupiah | Active | 6 | 4 | 1 | 10 | 7 | 28 | 0 | 5.6 |
| Sun Finance Latvia | Active | 15 | 12 | 12 | 11 | 13 | 63 | -1 | 6.6 |
| Credius | Active | 15 | 16 | 15 | 14 | 15 | 75 | +4 | 7.5 |
| Esto | Active | 15 | 12 | 13 | 16 | 16 | 72 | +1 | 7.8 |
| Dinerito | Active | 10 | 12 | 12 | 13 | 8 | 55 | 0 | 7.0 |
| Mikro Kapital Russia | Suspended | 8 | 13 | 12 | 10 | 10 | 53 | 0 | W/D |
| Mikro Kapital Romania | Active | 9 | 10 | 13 | 8 | 9 | 49 | +6 | 7.4 |
| Mikro Kapital Belarus | Active | 13 | 6 | 14 | 9 | 12 | 54 | -9 | W/D |
| Mikro Kapital Uzbekistan | Active | 11 | 6 | 8 | 10 | 8 | 43 | 0 | 7.3 |
| Mikro Kapital Moldova | Active | 8 | 9 | 12 | 11 | 11 | 51 | -3 | 8.0 |
| Kviku (Score W/D) | Suspended | 00 | W/D | ||||||
| ID Finance Spain | Active | 15 | 8 | 13 | 11 | 6 | 53 | -14 | 7.3 |
| Dziesiątka Finanse | Suspended | 6 | 10 | 10 | 13 | 13 | 52 | +9 | W/D |
| Swell | Active | 11 | 12 | 9 | 10 | 9 | 51 | +8 | 7.6 |
| Everest Finanse | Active | 8 | 18 | 14 | 12 | 13 | 65 | +5 | 6.9 |
| CashCredit | Active | 11 | 12 | 8 | 5 | 11 | 47 | +2 | 6.5 |
| Novaloans | Active | 11 | 8 | 9 | 11 | 12 | 51 | 0 | 6.5 |
Consider country risk too
Key updates: Jan - Feb 2024
New: BB Finance
It's been an extremely new time since Mintos brought a new lender onto the platform. We can't recall any new lenders arriving at all in 2023. BB Finance is a fairly typical type of Mintos lending company. It is based in Estonia, focuses on unsecured personal loans, and is quite small. It seems to be a fairly well run business, and it has made profits in the last 3 years. Balance sheet structure is in line with most other lenders appearing on Mintos. Our initial score is 58
Cashcredit
Cashcredit of Bulgaria has finally released its 2022 results. Who knows when we will get the 2023 results.... In any case not much has changed, other than it has moved from breaking even to making a small profit. It's a very small business with a loan portfolio of only €7m. Clearly this is too small to be able to hire a decent finance team, and the disclosure quality remains poor. We have upgraded our score by 2 to 47, to reflect the improvement in profits.
Score retained: Eleving (Mogo)
One company that definitely is large enough to have a decent finance team is Eleving (formerly Mogo). It has announced an unaudited profit of €23.4m for 2023, which is an excellent result. This marks two consecutive years of strong profits after struggling through the covid period. Q4 2023 results were in line with expectations. The main weakness continues to be the higher than normal leverage of its tangible book equity, however if it continues to generate strong levels of profits this may be addressed in time via retained earnings. Our score remains 71.
Esto
Esto has been active on Mintos for many years now. It is a mid-sized Estonian lending company. It has made very good progress over the years, with consistent growth of its assets and also growing profitability. In its Q3 2023 results it shows that it is on track to generate profits over €5m for the full year, which will be a 50% increase over 2022. We have increased the score by 1 to 72.
Score retained: Creditstar
The key thing we have been waiting to see from Creditstar is an announcement of progress in issuing shares to increase its equity levels. That's because it has a stretched balance sheet which has led to difficulties in raising debt funding, as well as other issues. Unfortunately there was no news on this in its 2H 2023 results. The company flagged the issuance of €12m of bonds in November, however this is relatively small for a business of this size. Profits for 2H 2023 were the same as for the first half of the year, with a total profit of €6.7m (down €2.1m on 2022). Our score remains 54.
Credifiel
Credifiel is a fairly large lending business in Mexico. It provides people advances against their upcoming wage payments, and has arrangements with employers to ensure that the loan is repaid direct to them. It's an interesting business model. It seems to be working, as it has announced strong profits for the first 9 months of 2023, and is on track to grow profit by 50% for the full year. Another thing we like about Credifiel is the conservative balance sheet structure, where loans are funded 50% with equity. Our latest score is up 2 to 69.
Planet 42
In June 2023 we downgraded the score of South African lender Planet42 and after reviewing the Q3 2023 results we have cut the score further. We have two (linked) concerns about the business. Firstly, it seems that the outlook for South Africa as a country continues to deteriorate due to several factors including political instability and mismanagement. We anticipate that levels of bad debts will increase. Over the last 18 months the currency has also depreciated strongly against the euro. We note that the shareholders equity reported by Planet42 has fallen noticeably due to 'FX translation reserves'. This has left it with €3m of equity against €68m of loans which is far too low to be sustainable long term. Our score is down 5 to 41.
Score retained: Placet Group
Placet Group is one of our highest rated lenders. Its loans appear both on Mintos and also its affiliated P2P site called Moncera. It seems to always make profits between €3-4m each year. It has announced profits of €3m for the first nine months of 2023 so that trend seems like it will continue. Boring, consistent results are good results when you are a lender. Our score remains 81.
Score retained: Iute Credit
While some lenders have still not published their 2022 results, Iute Credit has managed to produce their audited 2023 results already. which is extremely impressive. Underlying profits were slightly down on 2022, with some higher funding costs and higher impairment charges. However, the company still generated a profit of over €10m, and has grown shareholder equity to €63mcontinues to provide some of the fastest and detailed financial disclosures of any of the lenders appearing on Mintos. Maybe that's because their results tend to be strong, particularly over the last 2 years. The company made a profit of just over €12m in 2022, and is on track to make the same level of profit this year too. Credit quality is stable, as is their balance sheet leverage. Our score remains 77.
Score retained: Sun Finance
We have two scores for Sun Finance - 79 for the whole group, and 63 for the Latvian subsidiary (as this does not receive a group guarantee).Our scores remained unchanged following their latest results. The Sun Finance Group generated a huge €65m profit in 2022, and it is on track to earn something similar in 2023 based on their Sep 2023 results. The only downside we can see is that the shareholders have been paying out a large amount of the profits in dividends, however this is not too much of a concern if the company continues to perform as well as it has been. The profits of the Latvian subsidiary fell in 2022, but were still more than acceptable and balance sheet remains conservative.
Key updates: Sep - Dec 2023
Eleving (Mogo)
Eleving has been achieving fantastic results after coming through a difficult period in 2020. It posted a profit of €20m in 2022, and is on track to do even better in 2023, after making €19.4m in the first 9 months of the year. The increase in profitability is slowly reducing the over-levered position it had a few years ago. Credit quality of its loan portfolios has remained steady so far this year. Our latest score is up 3 to 71.
Score retained: Creditstar
In our last review, Creditstar had €3m of 'pending payments' owed to Mintos investors, which indicated that it had been experiencing liquidity issues. While it still hasn't announced any equity raises, it seems to be in a better position on the liquidity side, with virtually all of the pending payments now cleared. The financial results published continue to look fine, with a profit of €3.4m for the first half of 2023. If it can successfully raise some new equity, continue to generate strong profits, and keep pending payments low, we will likely increase our rating score for Creditstar. For now, our score remains 54.
IDF Eurasia Kazakhstan
During 2020-2022 we cut the score of IDF Kazakhstan to reflect the increased risks in that region of Europe. In 2022, their profits fell from €7.4m to €3.4m due to a deterioration in the quality of their loan portfolio, with rising levels of bad debts. However, we have reassessed their score taking into account the latest financials and macro conditions in Kazakhstan, and the result is a small increase in score from 51 to 57.
Evergreen
Evergreen is a small British payday lender. We have never been big fans because the quality of the financial reporting and disclosures has been fairly poor. It has disclosed that in 2022 it's profits fell from €1.3m to €0.8m. It's balance sheet continues to remain quite stretched. We have reduced the score by 7 to 42.
Hipocredit
Hipocredit is a small mortgage lender operating in the Baltic region. It's shareholders have links to the Mintos shareholder groups. It went several years without providing any financial information, but has now released its 2022 results. There were no real surprises, it continues to make small profits each year and has a stable balance sheet structure. Our score is up 6 to 47, to reflect a higher disclosure quality score following release of new financial information.
Score retained: Placet Group
Placet Group is a highly rated lender that has loans that appear on both Mintos and also its affiliated P2P site called Moncera. It has been a very steady business - it has made profits of between €3-4m in each of the last 5 years. Following the release of their 1H 2023 results it appears that they are on track to do that yet again, making a €2m profit for this period. Our score remains 81.
Score retained: Iute Credit
Iute Credit continues to provide some of the fastest and detailed financial disclosures of any of the lenders appearing on Mintos. Maybe that's because their results tend to be strong, particularly over the last 2 years. The company made a profit of just over €12m in 2022, and is on track to make the same level of profit this year too. Credit quality is stable, as is their balance sheet leverage. Our score remains 77.
Rapicredit
Rapicredit is a small lender based in Columbia. It has tended to make either small losses or profits each year. It does however seem to be a professionally run business, with good quality analysis and financial information provided. It made a profit of €0.7m in 2022, up from €0.5m in 2021. To reflect its improving track record and profitability, our score is up 6 to 51.
Score retained: Capem
Capem is a mid-sized lender to SME companies based in Mexico. It has announced its 4th consecutive year of increasing profits, growing from €1.1m in 2021 to €1.4m in 2022. That's not a huge profit given the size of its business, but at least the company is stable and consistent. Its lending portfolio seems to have a fairly stable credit quality. We have retained our score at 65
Credius
Credius provides personal loans and point of sale finance in Romania. One of the most notable things about the company is its balance sheet where it has extremely high levels of equity relative to its loan book. It isn't even clear why it really needs to borrow funds from the Mintos platform.... The company announced good profits for 2022 (€3m) which is in line with its 2021 results. Our score is up 4 to 75, to reflect the strengthening track record of the company.
Score retained: Delfin Group
Delfin Group has pretty much everything we look for in a lender. Profitable for the last 6 years. Growing, but not too quickly. Quick to release their results. High quality financial disclosures. Sensible balance sheet structure. Delfin announced record profits for Q3 2023, and looks on track to make a profit of over €7m for the year. We continue to rate them as one of the best lenders available, with a score of 82.
Other companies with scores retained
Following a review of their latest financial statements and management presentations, the following companies had no changes to their existing scores: Dinerito, GFM, Jet Finance, Mikro Capital Moldova, Mozipo
Key updates: July / August 2023
Iute Credit
Iute Credit is headquartered in Estonia but its key lending markets are in Moldova and Albania. These are higher risk countries (see our country risk ratings page). However, the financial performance of Iute Credit has consistent and strong for at least 5 years now, which has been impressive. They also provide some of the highest quality (and fastest) financial reports on their investor relations page. To reflect this, and the continued strong profits in their 1Q 23 results, our score is up 2 to 77.
Esto
Estonian buy-now-pay-later ('BNPL') lender has provided its results for the first half of 2023. The company continues to perform strongly, making a €2.5 profit during that 6 month period. If this trend continues, 2023 will be the 5th consecutive year that it has grown its revenues and profits, since it launched as a startup business. Our score increased by 3 to 71.
Score retained: Placet Group
Placet Group has long been one of our highest rated lenders. Its loans appear both on Mintos and also its affiliated P2P site called Moncera. It has been a very steady business - it has made profits of between €3-4m in each of the last 5 years. That type of consistency and track record is very valuable to P2P investors looking to buy their loans with a buyback guarantee. Another reason for our high rating has been their conservative balance sheet structure - their loans are almost 50% funded with their shareholder equity. Our score remains 81.
Sun Finance Group
Sun Finance subsidiaries and sister companies have been present on Mintos for many years. In 2019 the Sun Finance Group was formed to bring them together. Some subsidiaries (such as in Kazakhstan) receive formal group guarantees, while in others (Poland) it is implied. However, based on the latest published audited results, it seems unlikely any subsidiaries will be running into trouble. The group made an incredible profit of €66m in 2022, up from €51m the year before. It has also been winning several awards, such as Top European Fintech from the Financial Times. To reflect the high profitability and strong momentum of the group, our score is up 10 to 79.
Score retained: Eleving
Eleving (formerly Mogo) has published their latest results, with profits increasing from €5.7m in Q1 23 to €6.7m in Q2 23. Management say that they are focusing on risk management and efficiency over growth - we think that's a good thing for lenders to the company. It seems to have taken a bit of a breather with its growth trajectory, with the balance sheet not growing during the quarter. Lending performance is satisfactory, with fairly stable levels of non-performing loans. Our score remains 68.
Key updates: May / June 2023
Esto
Esto operates primarily in Estonia and offers a buy-now-pay-later ('BNPL') service. While many BNPL operators globally have been struggling, Esto has been performing pretty well, making €3.7m of profit in 2022. Impairment losses remained fairly consistent as a percentage of revenues, even as the business grew quickly during 2022. The overall leverage of the business fell in 2022, due to the retention of the profits it generated. Our score increased by 3 to 68.
Score retained: Eleving
Eleving (formerly Mogo) has continued to announce buoyant operating results, with a Q1 23 profit of €5.7m. This follows a 2022 profit of €20m. While funding costs have been increasing due to rising interest rates, Eleving has experienced a significant reduction in impairment expenses. It seems to have taken a bit of a breather with its growth trajectory, with the balance sheet not growing during the quarter. In the past, Eleving has grown too quickly at times, so this is not a bad thing from a creditors' perspective. Our score remains 68, with the high financial leverage remaining the primary reason why it scores lower than some other loan originators on Mintos.
Planet42
In March we upgraded the score of Planet42, on the basis of the decent results it released for the first half of 2022. Well, unfortunately, it seems that things have not been going that well for the South African lender. After making a profit of €0.7m in the first half of 2022, it went on to make a loss of €1.8m in the second half of 2022, followed by a further loss of €0.5m in Q1 23. The quality of the latest financial reporting is not strong - it is difficult to understand exactly why there has been a reversal of fortunes. It appears partly related to higher funding costs, and partly due to impairment costs. We also highlight that South Africa has also been experiencing currency depreciation recently, and issues with energy supplies. Our score is down 10 to 46.
Score retained: Creditstar
Nothing much seems to have changed at Creditstar - it continues to announce strong profits (€1.9m in Q1 23), but it still hasn't announced any major equity raises. The business has been experiencing liquidity issues, as shown by the €3m of 'pending payments' it owes Mintos investors. However, for some reason, despite the strong profits it has been publishing, it hasn't been able to raise the additional equity it needs to reduce financial leverage and support future growth of the company. Until that happens, we remain very cautious of Creditstar, even though on paper, it is much stronger than most of the lenders appearing on Mintos. Our score remains 54.
Score retained: ID Finance Spain
ID Finance Spain has now announced two consecutive years of excellent results, generating over €10m of profits in both 2021 and 2022. That's a high level of profitability for only a mid-sized lending business. What's strange however is the behaviour of its shareholders, who paid out almost all of the 2021 profits as profits during 2022. That isn't typical behaviour for a business that says it is one of the fast growing Fintech businesses, and weakens the position of creditors such as Mintos investors. The company is more highly leveraged than it appears, when you dig into the detail of its financial statements. For these reasons, despite the high profitability reported by ID Finance Spain, our rating remains at 53.
Key updates: March / April 2023
Score retained: Eleving
Eleving (formerly Mogo) has announced strong results for 2022. Profits have more than doubled to €20m, and the company grew its lending portfolio by 18%. This is fairly high but not too fast to make us worried. Our rating score remains 68. We still believe that the weakness of Eleving is its high leverage. It is one of the few lenders that appear on Mintos that have a credit rating. However that credit rating is unfortunately very weak (Fitch, B-). This weakness is due to the high leverage, and other reasons such as the countries that it operates in.
Dinerito
Dinerito has a business model that we really like. It lends to Mexican borrowers and collects the repayments directly from their salary payments. This type of lending is much lower risk than the normal 'payday' style loans that appear on the Mintos marketplace. The downside of this type of lending is that it has lower interest rates and it can be harder to make profits. Dinerito was on track to make almost €1m for 2022 (based on its latest Q3 2022 financials) and has a reasonable funding structure. We have increased our score by 6 to 55.
Everest
Everest Finanse are a large Polish consumer finance company, with more than 100,000 customers. Their presentations and financial data are usually low quality. However, they are a business that has been profitable for 5 years and are backed by credible investors. While many lenders appearing in Mintos are under-capitalised, that is definitely not the case with Everest. They have too much equity if anything. That leaves them with a low return on their equity, but if you are a Mintos lender, that's not your problem... Our score is up 5 to 65.
Iute Credit
We really wish all the lenders on Mintos provided financial information that was as as regular, and high quality, as provided by Iute Credit. Perhaps they are keen to report regularly because their results tend to be very consistent, and strong. For 2022, their (unaudited) profits were €6.1m, up from €5.2m in 2021. Iute Credit has been one of our highest rated lenders for many years - the biggest issue has been finding loans that are available and offer a decent interest rate. Our new score is up 2 to 77.
Planet42
We have always loved the business model of Planet42. It operates in South Africa, and provides loans to help the under-banked community get access to vehicles. This allows them to earn an income, and Planet42 retains ownership of the vehicle until the loan is repaid. That being said, South Africa is a higher risk country to operate in, and the company has less equity capital than we would like to see. In the first half of 2022, which are the most recent results available, the company made a profit of €0.7m. That's a great result for a small but growing business. To reflect this growth in profitability, we have increased our score by 4 to 56.
Comment: Creditstar
Creditstar had promised to clear its 'pending payment' debts to Mintos investors by the end of March, as it expected to be able to raise funding from various sources. They have made some progress in reducing the amount of pending amounts owed by around half, but there are still over €4m of overdue payments outstanding. It is quite surprising how difficult the company has found it to raise funds. Creditstar has announced (unaudited) profits of almost €9m for 2022, and shareholders equity of €49m. Something doesn't quite add up. Our score remains 54, and we will remain cautious about Creditstar until it is able to demonstrate a stronger funding situation, and/or hire a better finance team, regardless of how much profits it reports.
Farewell to...
Podemos Progresar Mintos love to make big announcements about new lenders but the ones that leave tend to quietly exit. Podemos Progresar is a small Mexican lender that focused on lending to low income women. No issues with the company have been announced by Mintos, so either the company was able to find cheaper sources of funding, or Mintos just decided that they were no longer welcome on the site.
Other companies with scores retained
Following a review of their latest financial statements and management presentations, the following companies had no changes to their existing scores: GFM, ID Finance Spain, Delfin Group, Creditstar
Key updates: January/ February 2023
Comment: Creditstar
Creditstar is an important Mintos lender that has been running a large 'pending payment' position (i.e in default on its obligations to investors). It had previously promised to cover its €8.3m pending payment position by the end of 2022 via a bond issue, but that has not happened. Mintos now says that Creditstar is in the process of obtaining €10-15m of liquidity from a new investor, which will allow it to cover the pending payments. What Creditstar really seems to need is a large injection of equity, which would provide it with permanent liquidity and increase confidence in its financial position. It is unclear why it hasn't been able to do this, give the strong profits it has reported over the last few years. For now, investors should remain cautious.
Comment: ID Finance companies
ID Finance has 3 businesses that borrow from the Mintos platform located in Kazakhstan, Spain and Mexico. Their investor relations team send monthly emails saying how well the businesses are all doing, and growing quickly. The reality however is that each business have had large pending payment positions for some time, and the quality of financial information provided by each company is usually very poor. Fitch Ratings highlighted that ID Finance Spain chose to make a large dividend payment in 2022, shortly before running short of liquidity. That's a sign of a poorly run business. Both Mintos and ID Finance claim that the companies will raise new equity and debt during Q1 2023, which will reduce the amount of pending payments. We hope they are able to do so, but there has to be significant doubts that all the liquidity issues will be resolved during the next two months.
Key updates: December 2022
Delfin Group
Delfin Group has been one of our highest rated loan originators for many years and there were no surprises in their Q3 2022 results. Delfin is on track to make a profit of €5.7m this year, and it has been consistently profitable for many years now. It has been growing its loan-book strongly this year after being quite conservative on lending during the Covid period. Delfin is listed and the company trades at a market cap of approximately €58m. Yes this is small, but it represents a value 240% higher than shareholders equity of the company - clearly shareholders like the high rates of profitability and outlook for the company. We have increased our score by 2 to 82.
Placet Group
Placet Group is another loan originator that has been achieving high scores for a long time. It has had very stable earnings and a sensible balance sheet structure. After many years of profits in the €3-4m range, it looks like Placet Group is going to break through into the €5m region this year based on their latest Q3 results. Balance sheet continues to be very solid with their assets being majority funded by equity. The biggest downside is that available supply (and interest rates) on Mintos are low. To buy loans we would recommend opening an account at Moncera, which is the P2P site operated by Placet. They recently released some new loans at a 10% yield, which is much higher than the 6% available at Mintos. Meanwhile, our score is up 2 to 81
Key updates: November 2022
Comment: Creditstar
In October we downgraded our score for Creditstar by 10 to 54 due to rising levels of 'pending payments' (see below). Since then the company has published Q3 financials which showed profits of €6.9m year to date. The company also notes that it plans to issue a new bond and also do an equity raise. It claims that it could cover the pending payments now but 'this would sacrifice growth and the targets we have set for this year'. This is a very strange statement to make publicly, as it makes the company appear more focused on their objectives than fulfilling their contractual obligations to P2P investors. The more likely reality however, is that until the company is able to issue their new bond, and raise additional equity, the company does not have sufficient liquidity on hand to make the payments required right now to cover the pending payments. We expect that the company will be able to issue bonds and raise new equity, but for now the risk remains higher than in the past for investors in Creditstar loans.
Eleving (Mogo)
Eleving has been having an exceptionally strong 2022 so far, driven by strong interest income growth. This has been achieved from a combination of portfolio growth and higher average yields. At the same time, interest costs have been flat, which has helped to generate a year to date profit of almost €18m. Credit quality also appears to be under control. Impairment losses and NPL ratios did increase during this year, but not more than could be expected given the difficult macro environment. Eleving has always had high levels of leverage, and this continues to be their biggest weakness when analysing their financial profile. However the company is now in a much stronger position than it was in two years ago, and our scores have been increasing to reflect this. Our latest score is up 2 to 68.
Note: Sun Finance
Sun Finance is one of the larger lending groups operating on Mintos. It operates in many countries globally. We have revisited our ratings approach because of changes to the group guarantee arrangements. We now provide a score for the group - 69, that applies to companies who receive this group guarantee. Sun Finance Latvia does not receive this guarantee and receives a score of 64. There are two Polish entities that also do not receive a guarantee. Ducatos (48) has a significantly higher score than its sister company Primastar (19) as Primastar is heavily loss making and has negative equity in its balance sheet.
ExpressCredit Namibia
ExpressCredit is a small lender based in Namibia. It has developed a high level of 'pending payments' in recent months which Mintos has attributed to legal and regulatory complications with the transition to the new notes format Mintos is using. While some complications could be expected with this transition, the high level of pending payments suggests that ExpressCredit is over-reliant on funding from Mintos and has limited alternative liquidity sources. It appears that the company may have re-lent the funds collected, rather than pass them to Mintos investors. Our latest score for ExpressCredit Namibia is 21
LF Tech
We have not increased our scores for many companies recently but the audited 2021 results for the company justified this. The company achieved a profit of €9.4m, which is impressive given that the size of the loan portfolio is only €37m. LF Tech is based in Kazakhstan, which is often considered a higher risk country but its economy has been performing well during 2022 due to strong oil and gas prices. Our score is up 8 to 56
Watu Credit
Watu Credit operates in Uganda. It provides motorcycle finance that then helps its borrowers to generate self employment income. After a loss in 2020, it achieved a profit of 1.2m in 2021. We would like to see it increase its level of capital however, as it is a more leveraged company than most lenders on Mintos. We do like the social benefit aspects of the company and hope it is successful. Our new score is up 7 to 48
Note: Capital Service
Thanks to our reader Filip who spotted that the 2021 financial statements for Capital Service had been published on a government website. Capital Service is currently in default and has been in discussions with Mintos over the terms that the amounts outstanding will be fully repaid. What can we learn from the financials? There are some positive aspects for creditors - the company made a profit of €3.6m in 2021, and now has a (small) positive equity position of €1.7m. The downside for investors is that the loan book was almost entirely being funded by Mintos investors. This heavy reliance on Mintos P2P funding could make it difficult to find a solution that quickly repays investors the funds they are owed.
Cash Credit
Cash Credit is a fairly standard payday lending company operating in Bulgaria. It seems to struggle with profitability - it tends to just about break even, with a small loss in 2021. It is also a small business, with a loan portfolio of only €6m. One positive is that it has a conservative balance sheet structure, with the equity of €2.9m providing a good level of cushion for investors. Our score fell 12 to 45.
Finclusion
The Finclusion group has a bit of a complicated history. It took over some lending operations from a holding company called MyBucks, who had 4 other operations (called GetBucks) that defaulted on their Mintos obligations. While those businesses seem to be in run-off, the Finclusion owned companies are doing better, making a small profit of €0.4m in 2021. The company has an impressive balance sheet structure, with equity of €12.4m funding a loan portfolio of €16.7m. The improvement in the company's profitability, and strong balance sheet led us to increase our score by 16 to 51
Companies with scores retained
Following a review of their latest financial statements and management presentations, the following companies had no changes to their existing scores: Alivio, DanaRupiah, Evergreen, Mozipo Group, Novaloans
Key updates: October 2022
Creditstar
During October, the 'pending payments' (or overdue payments) outstanding on Mintos has reached €8.9m. At the same time, it has been offering customers on its Lendermarket P2P site bonus offers of up to 3% to invest additional funds. It has committed to Mintos that it will cover all pending payments by the end of the year, and will pay investors an extremely high interest rate of 18% until this happens. It seems that Creditstar is finding it difficult to raise funds at the moment, potentially due to difficult conditions in the bond market where it has historically raised funds. It isn't clear how it will raise the needed funds - presumably this can partly be achieved by reducing the size of its loan portfolio. In the meantime we have reduced our score by 10 to 54 to reflect the increased risk level.
IDF Eurasia
IDF Eurasia is another Mintos loan originator that has published strong financial results, yet still seems to be having difficulty with its supply of funding. Its pending payments have reached €15.5m, an average delay of 135 days. This has been attributed to difficulties completing the sale of a new bond that would refinance Mintos investors. The company had committed to paying €11m by October 31 towards the outstanding pending payments but this does not seem to have been achieved by the company and is instead now paying the balance at the rate of €1m a week. We have reduced our score by 12 to 51 to reflect the increased risk level.
ID Finance Mexico
All of the amounts outstanding on Mintos from ID Finance Mexico have a pending payment status. The current amount outstanding in this category is €7.3m. This is very material as the total size of the loan portfolio was only €15.5m in its last financial statements. Mintos has asked the company to repay the funds by the end of the year and is charging interest at the rate of 17.6%. We would like to have received more information from Mintos about what the underlying situation is with this company. In the meantime our new score is down 15 to 33.
ID Finance Spain
ID Finance Spain also has high current levels of pending payments - just under €11m. Again the reason for this has not been explained adequately by them or Mintos - the company reported very strong profits of €10.5m during 2021. Its last fundraising valued the company at €220m. The company has committed to repay the pending payment amounts by the end of the year and pay 17.6% interest until it does. It is not clear what the sources of funding will be to achieve this. Our new score is down 14 to 53.
Key updates: August & September 2022
Eleving (Mogo)
Eleving is the largest lender on the Mintos platform. It announced excellent H1 2022 results, with a profit of €7.4m. Revenues increased by 47% over the same period in 2021. Credit quality remains fairly stable. The biggest concern is that Eleving has more financial leverage than most of the lenders on Mintos. Our score is up 4 to 66
Score retained: Creditstar
Creditstar is an important company in the P2P space and its results are followed closely. It has announced a profit of €3.5m for the first half of 2022. This is a stable profit level compared to its audited profits for 2021. Our score remains 64. To gain a higher score we would like to see Creditstar reduce its leverage ratio
Score retained: Delfin
Delfin has released its Q2 2022 results and they continue to be excellent, with a profit of €1.2m. Delfin receives high scores because of its strong and steady profit levels, a sensible balance sheet structure, excellent reporting and a long track record. Our score remains 80
Cash Credit
Cash Credit is a small Bulgarian lender. Since our last analysis they have increased their capital levels significantly, and also improved their balance sheet structure. Earnings have now been stable for 3 years straight. These positive developments have led us to increase the rating score by 8 to 57
Score retained: Esto
We have been pretty impressed with the small Estonian lender Esto. Since launching as a start up it reached profitability quickly. It has then grown its earnings over each of the last 4 years, reaching a profit of €3.3m in 2021. Our score remains 65
Everest
Polish lending firm Everest disclosed a large loss in Q1 2022. The financial report says that this was caused by a financial transaction the company executed but it did not provide sufficient information for us to analyse the situation properly. We have reduced the score by 9 to 60
Score retained: Placet
Placet Group is one of the highest quality lenders available for P2P investors to purchase loans from. It has a long history of steady profits, and a sensible balance sheet structure. It earned €1.8m in 1H 2022, right in line with expectations. Our score remains 79
Swell
When small Mexican lender joined Mintos it did not have much of a financial record, which is why it only received an initial score of 43. It managed to break into profit for the first time during 2021. It remains small however, and higher risk than many other lenders. Our score has increased by 8 to 51
Note: Wowwo
Wowwo is a Turkish motor dealer and finance company. It has defaulted on its Mintos obligations, which it blamed on losses caused by depreciation of the Turkish Lira against the Euro. In its most recent audited financial statements, the auditors stated that in some areas the company had not complied with accounting standards. The audited results were also significantly worse than the management accounts that had been provided to Mintos. In short, the situation has been a total mess, and the company has lost the confidence of investors. We were quite surprised to see that the company had uploaded management accounts for the period to Sep 2021. This shows quite a different picture, with a very strong equity position of €24m, and a run rate profit of €3.3m. The profit and equity position is very surprising given that the Lira depreciated by over 30% during this period. Since Sep 2021, the value of the Lira has almost halved again in value. This is not good news for Mintos investors, as the company has been running an unhedged FX position, and means that the likely recovery rate continues to fall.
Zenka
When Kenyan lender Zenka was launched on Mintos we gave it a very low rating of 26. That's because it was a tiny startup, loss making and had a negative shareholders equity balance. To give the company credit, it had a great 2021, making a profit of €3m. This, together with an equity injection has helped it plug its equity hole, which is now (positive) €3.7m. The company is now in a much better position than when they launched on Mintos, and our score is up 21 to 47
Note: Fenchurch
Mintos have announced that they will not list any new loans from British litigation financing firm Fenchurch, because its parent company has entered into insolvency. While the insolvency does not directly impact Fenchurch, we can understand why Mintos took this decision. Hopefully the parent company will receive an equity injection, or Fenchurch can be sold to a new owner. The risk for investors is that Fenchurch only has €0.5m of equity. This small equity buffer creates risks for investors if Fenchurch can't quickly find a new owner
Key updates: June & July 2022
Score retained: IDF Eurasia Kazakhstan
IDF Eurasia published its audited results for 2021. Profits were quite strong - up from €5.7m to €9.0m. While the company's finances are currently fine, there are of course significant political risks in the region Kakazkhstan sits. In particular there is a risk that Russia is able to block the country's oil exports, which account for 14% of GDP. Our score remains 63
ID Finance Spain
ID Finance Spain lends to the 'underbanked' population, which is another way of saying high risk borrowers. However their strategy is currently working, with profits in 2021 increasing significantly to €10.5m, from €2.5m the year before. While the company has reasonably high levels of non-performing loans, the interest it generates is sufficient to cover losses. The company's level of leverage is also reasonable. Our score is up 8 to 67
Score retained: Placet Group
Placet Group has now published its results for the second half of 2021 and first quarter of Q1 2022. The company has consistently generated profits of between €3-4m a year for many years now and that trend continued in 2021. The company continues to run with only modest leverage levels, and as a result has one of our highest scores for capitalisation levels. Our score remains 79
Score retained: Planet42
Planet42 is a South African company that leases cars. It launched on Mintos at the end of last year. The company's 2021 results were in line with expectations, based on the figures provided by management when they launched. While car financing is generally a lower risk lending activity, the company has quite a lot of leverage and is only at break-even profitability currently. Our score remains 52
Rapicredit
Rapicredit is a very small Columbian lending company, with a loan portfolio of below €10m. It's not particularly profitable, and doesn't score highly on any of our other metrics. To reflect the company becoming profitable in 2021, and some other improvements, our score increased by 10, to 45
Key updates: May 2022
New: Credifiel
New lender Credifiel specialises in payroll lending. It is based in Mexico and has been operating since 2005. Payroll lending has a lower risk than unsecured lending as the repayments are deducted from an employee's salary packet. This can be seen in the company's P&L, where they generate $3.50 in interest for every $1 of provision cost. Credefiel made a profit of €2.3m in 2021, and has had a consistent profit record since 2017. Overall though the business seems to be performing well and is solidly capitalised. Our initial score is 67
Creamfinance
Creamfinance has published its audited results for 2021 and unaudited results for Q1 22. The business is doing well, making a €3.4m profit in 2021 and doing even better in Q1 22. Prior to 2021 the business had had a fairly weak profit profile, which was the main reason its score was not as high as similar companies. Our score has increased 6 to 68, mainly due to the strengthening earnings of the company
Score retained: Delfin
Delfin has released its Q1 2022 results and they continue to be excellent, with a profit of €1.4m. The company ticks a lot of boxes - steady but growing profits, a sensible balance sheet structure, excellent investor reporting and a long track record. Our score remains 80
Sun Finance Latvia
Sun Finance Latvia has provided new financial information after a wait of almost 2 years. The results are very strong, with a profit of €7.7m for 2021, following a profit of €6.9m in 2020. The balance sheet shows that the loans are almost entirely funded with shareholders equity, and only a small balance from Mintos. Everything looks great - the only (and fairly large) concern is that the numbers are not audited and minimal other information has been provided. Our new score is up 9 to 65. It would be much higher if reporting improved
Note: Kviku
Kviku is a Russian lending group that was quickly suspended from the primary market by Mintos after the outbreak of the Ukraine war and related sanctions against Russia. Interestingly the results they have published for 2021 are extremely strong, with a profit of €10.8m and very strong asset growth. Kviku has been pretty quiet recently, with limited updates on the situation. Over 90% of listed loans now have a 'pending payment' status. This is caused by multiple restrictions preventing the wire of funds out of Russia. We have decided to remove our scores for Kviku until the situation changes
Eleving (Mogo)
Eleving is one of the largest and most important lenders on Mintos. It provides loans secured on second hand cars, mainly in Eastern Europe. It has now released its audited results for 2021. Profits were lower than shown in the previously provided management accounts - €7.1m vs €8.8m. Of this only €2.1m was attributable to the parent company, the rest was attributable to minority shareholders. Both of these factors have led us to reduce our profit score, as the underlying earnings of the parent company were lower than expected.The other continuing area of concern is the high level of leverage being run by Mintos. While the 'headline' shareholders equity figure of €31.3m may look OK, after deducting minority interests and intangible assets, the adjusted figure is only €10.2m. That is a low amount for a company with €322m of assets. Our adjusted score is down 6 to 62, to reflect the audited profit figure and the high balance sheet leverage.
Key updates: April 2022
New: Financiera Contigo
Mintos has announced that Mexican lender 'Financiera Contigo' has joined the platform. It's a brand name of a Mexican lending group called CEGE. CEGE has guaranteed the debts of another (small) lender that joined Mintos last year called Conmigo Vales. Conmigo Vales is not a subsidiary of CEGE but it has overlapping shareholders (known as a 'sister' company). Last year we gave Conmigo Vales a score of 50, noting that we had based our score on CEGE and discounted it because Conmigo Vales itself was very small and also
because a guarantee from a company is not as strong as a direct claim. Originally we understood that ‘Financiera Contigo’ was a sister company or subsidiary, but the Mintos team kindly reached out to us to explain that it is just a brand used by CEGE itself. Based on our review of the latest audited financials for CEGE, and their track record, we have assigned a score of 63 to Financiera Contigo / CEGE.
Score retained: GoCredit
GoCredit published its unaudited 2021 financials. They were in line with expectations, with a profit of €1.5m for the year, slightly up on 2020. The main strength of GoCredit is its strong balance sheet, with very low levels of leverage. It said that it had reduced its cost of funds during 2021 which will further make the business stronger. Our score remains 66
Key updates: March 2022
ID Finance Spain
ID Finance provided a webcast during March outlining its results for 2021. Things are going well, with a €10.5m made by its Spanish business during 2021. It recently raised equity on Crowdcube at a €220m valuation. They have not yet published full financials, but in the interim we have increased the score by 5 to 59, with potential for a further increase once we review the financial statements
Score retained: Iute Credit
Iute Credit announced a 2021 profit of €6.1m, in line with expectations. The company's loan portfolio is performing well, with lower provisioning cost %'s than in 2020. Our score remains 75
Farewell to...
Capitalia and Sun Finance Denmark . Capitalia had been active on Mintos for many years but like many other loan originators, it has now setup its own P2P site. We are not surprised to see Sun Finance Denmark leave, as new regulations have made it difficult to operate profitably in the country.
Farewell to...
Agrocredit and Pay PS . Both lenders seem to have left Mintos without any announcement. In the case of Pay PS that is a lucky thing, as it is a small Russian lender. Estonian lender Agrocredit had been on Mintos for many years but was also small.
Key updates: February 2022
New: Planet42
Planet42 calls itself a 'socially inclusive' car finance company. In practice that seems to mean lending to people in South Africa with thin or poor credit profiles at interest rates above 50%. Still, we think a business model like this could be successful. It has now reached break-even and is growing quickly. In December 2021, it raised $30m in funding. The figures provided do not include this funding, but we have considered it in our initial score, which is 52.
Delfin Group
Delfin Group successfully IPO'd on Nasdaq Riga during Q4 2021 which is a very positive achievement for the company. It raised over €8m and sensibly used the funds to buy back bonds with high coupons. The reporting quality of Delfin continues to be very good, and we expect this to continue now that it is a listed company. Delfin has announced (unaudited) profits of €4.2m for 2021. Our score is up 3 to 80.
Score retained: Eleving
Eleving (formerly Mogo) is one of the most important lending companies on Mintos. It has released its unaudited Q4 21 results. Eleving appears to have made a small loss in Q4 but the overall result for the year was still satisfactory - a profit of €8.8m. Our main concern continues to be that it is operating with high levels of leverage - it really needs more equity if it wants to continue to grow. Our score remains 68.
Creditstar
Creditstar has announced (unaudited) profits of €7.1m for 2021. In December it raised €3.9m of equity, and also issued €10.5m of bonds. These are all clearly positive milestones, and our score is up 3 to 64. Following our review of the 2020 annual report we remain concerned about some of Creditstar's accounting practices and our score reflects some adjustments we have made to reported equity values and profits.
Farewell to...
Alfakredyt is a small Polish lending company that has now left Mintos after 'moving to a different funding model'. It had not provided any financial information since 2018 so we had been expecting it to depart for some time. All investors have been fully repaid.
Key updates: January 2022
Zenka
Zenka is a small lender based in Kenya. Its audited accounts for 2020 show a significant loss, and a negative equity position. Its latest management presentation says that the business has become profitable in 2021, and that it received an equity injection from shareholders so that it could repay Mintos lenders. Our score is down 20 to 26
Creditter
Creditter is another small lender. It is based in Russia. It has now been profitable in the both years that we have financial information available. It has quite a conservative balance sheet structure. Our score is up 14 to 47
Score retained: Esto
Esto is a mid-sized lender based in Estonia. It has developed a good track record now, with consistently growing profits. While at first look it seems a little under-capitalised, there is also €3m of subordinated debt that provides additional protection to Mintos lenders. Our score remains 65
Evergreen
Evergreen is a payday lending company based in the UK. It has a fairly good track record, generating profits of €0.9m in 2020 and 2019. We expect profits to have increased in 2021. Our score is up 3 to 49
Farewell to...
Pinjam Yuk and TasCredit Both of these companies appear to have been quietly removed from the platform without any announcement from Mintos. Pinjam Yuk ran into problems at the beginning of the Covid crisis. TasCredit is based in Kazakhstan which is currently experiencing significant internal political issues. Mintos investors have been fully repaid by both companies
Next step: consider adding these sites to your portfolio
EstateGuru is an excellent site that offers loans secured on real estate. Rates are high - around 11%. Currently mainly focused on the Baltic region of Europe but with plans to expand into other countries.
Robocash is an international lending group that offers loans via its own P2P site. We like Robocash because the lending group is extremely profitable, and the site offers high returns (9-14.5%)
Bulkestate is a small but growing site focused on loans secured on real estate. It offers loans secured by real estate. Their rates are the highest in Europe for secured loans currently (11-14%)
October is focused on lending to small businesses in France, Spain and Italy. Rates are often a little lower than the other sites we list here, but some investors will like October due to the countries it operates in.
All information published on ExploreP2P is subject to important disclaimers contained on our legal page here. No liability is accepted for the accuracy or otherwise of any information, scores or views published, and any direct or indirect losses are expressly disclaimed.
Hi,
€ 30 millions equity for Mogo is based on the presentation result for the investor conference call and contain a subordinated debt of € 11.9 millions but when looking at the unaudited financial accounts it looks like this subordinated debt is rather short term: “Subordinated loans comprise a loan received by the Parent company from its shareholders. The subordinated loan was acquired as one of the conditions to obtain financing from Eurobonds described further below. The loans are denominated in EUR with an interest rate of 3-10% and maturing on July 2022.”
It is not included in Equity in the financial accounts but in borrowings where imo it belongs indeed more than in equity. Subordinated debt qualifying as prudential equity in banking for instance must fulfil a certain numbers of criteria and the maturity itself here does not (Tier 2 which is the lowest quality of own funds is basically 10 years subordinated debt).
It’s a good point Julien, we will try and find out a little more about this and why the maturity is so short, and what the best presentation is.
Hi, I was wondering about increasing my Creamfinance exposure but their B- Mintos rating worries me. Many B- are rubbish, yet Creamfinance does not look that bad. I have the presentation that can be downloaded from their website. It contains some selected financial data. Would anybody have the complete audited financials? Thank you.
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Updates from Mogo
https://mogo.finance/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Unaudited-interim-condensed-consolidated-financial-statements-for-the-period-ended-30-June-2020.pdf
https://mogo.finance/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Unaudited-interim-financial-statements-for-the-period-ended-June-30-2020.pdf
Hi, you show Esto as not audited. It is by KPMG Tallinn. You can find the document on Mintos, https://www.mintos.com/en/loan-originators/ESTO/#general
Thanks – that’s a new document we hadn’t seen before.
Hi Oscar,
I think I miss something. Where is LF Tech from Kazakhstan?
We removed them because they no longer seem to be active on Mintos any longer. There are no loans outstanding. They had also not provided any financial information since 2018 (most likely because they were no longer active).
Hi,
what do you think of this guy’s investigation?
https://kristapsmors.substack.com/p/mintos-and-conflicts-of-interest
I was not able to verify the facts he is presenting, but if he is right, the conflict of interests in Mintos/Mogo and Finko, ExpressCredit, and many more LOs is very obvious. It would then make sense (from Mintos/Finko/Mogo perspective) why Mintos did not invoke the Finko group guarantee in Varks case … and I am afraid Mintos users best interests were among the last things considered.
Well… Just looking at how weakly Mintos tries to chase what they ironically call the ‘Pending Payments’ is (I think) a sign that gives to Kristaps blog post a strong credit…
That’s just my personal feeling, of course 🙂
You have set the disclosure quality score to 0 for LOs that have stale reporting data (no 2019 yet), e.g. Dineo, which I think is fair. But you seem to have missed a few, e.g. Lime Zaim? They still score 11 for Disclosure Quality.
Thanks – after investigating this we can see we updated our score for the 2019 Lime Zaim results but failed to update the financial summary table. Thanks for pointing this out,it’s been updated now.
No update about Tigo and Kredo acquisition by Mogo (à la Sebo)?
New report from Kviku:
https://www.iuvo-group.com/en/kviku-h1-news-development
Thanks – Iuvo seems to do a much better job than Mintos in publishing up to date financial information on its LO’s…
The table says Placet Group is not audited, but I think it is, by E&Y.
Thanks – agreed and updated. Placet Group’s disclosures are good, and they have asked us for input on how they can improve them further.
Oscar, what do you think about criticism targeted towards Creditstar’s audits by Kristaps Mors?
I would be interested too. Does Creditstar have a reputable auditor now (as they promised a few times before)?
Oscar, I would be interested as well. I have investments in Creditstar both in Mintos and in Lendermarket. Thank you!
Yes. Now. They say that they have appointed KPMG. However their first audit will be the Dec 2020 financials.
There’s some valid criticism by Kristaps for sure – once a company reaches a certain size it should really progress and move up from local to internationally known firms. They say that they have also been using ‘Big 4’ firms for various advisory and consulting advice. Creditstar have told us that they planned to appoint KPMG for the 2019 audit (which would have taken place some time in Q1/Q2 2020), but Covid disrupted these plans and their previous auditor was retained. That seems a strange explanation as you normally appoint an auditor prior to year end, before Covid had arrived. In any case I think the team at Creditstar have become more than aware that people are now holding them to a higher standard. That’s a good thing.
OK, thanks for your reply
IuteCredit normalizes still more as it’s about to get its stocks listed on Regular Frankfurt Stock Exchange. Their bonds were already listed there.
https://iutecredit.com/uplisting-in-regulated-market-marks-starting-point-for-further-expansion-of-business-activities-and-additional-capital-sourcing/
Excellent news. Iute is pretty safe and behaved impeccably during their Kosovo problem, but how much do you really earn on a Iute loan? Today on Mintos I received the first instalment for an Albanian loan, the returned capital earned no interest for 2 days of grace period and no interest for 7 days of pending payment. It is a one year loan at 12,2%, if these delays are repeated every month for each instalment in the end that 12,2% will actually be less than 9%. Safe, but showing misleading headline interest rates.
I think you got your math wrong. If the loan runs for a year, the impact of any pending payments will be very minimal as only the installment of the loan that is currently due does not generate income during that time. The rest of the capital remains unaffected and still generates interest. Grace period/pending payments really only have a noticeable effect on payday loans. The longer the loan term, the less of an impact pending payments have.
Well spotted, you are right. Thank you Leo!
Hi, How is it possible that you keep Creditstar in such a high rank if they are struggling with their transparency over many years already and aren’t capable of showing a serious audit?
Could you be so kind and detail how exactly are the audited accounts of Creditstar for 2019 not serious? Thank you.
Yta Adami likely refers to this blog post:
https://kristapsmors.substack.com/p/creditstar-no-audit-no-problem
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Why has Wowwo been removed from your list of LO updates? A
Hi Thomas – we only keep around 3 months of commentary / updates on the page, otherwise it just gets too long.
I understand but I can see that other LOs are getting updates and I just thought if there was a problem or no. So there havent been any updates for them?
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Probably nothing new, I received this email on the 28th regarding Aforti. I still did not see anything on their website regarding this…
Apparently Aforti is to transfer 25k€ on a weekly basis to Mintos… Since they owe around 2m€, in just some 80 weeks it will all be sorted out (contains irony)! Well, better than nothing, but let’s see if this time they keep the agreement and do not use it to halt/postpone a legal action…
Btw, it puzzles me how Aforti still has 32k€ current loans according to statistics page… How could that be possible? After the business agreement being terminated, I was expecting an implicit compulsory repurchase of all loans and particularly no loan extensions… Does anyone have a hint on what might be happening?
————————
Dear ( ),
You are receiving this email as an investor with active investments in Aforti Finance issued loans: € 0.00 outstanding investments and € X.XX pending payments.
We inform you that as a result of continued negotiations between Mintos and Aforti Finance, the lending company has resumed making payments. The company has already covered the outstanding debt accumulated towards Mintos.
Aside from that, Aforti Finance still has a significant amount of pending payments due to investors on Mintos. The lending company has now resumed covering these payments by transferring € 25 000 on a weekly basis. Today, the first of such payments was transferred to investors on Mintos. The payment is being distributed to investors in the usual pending payments settlement sequence.
In the meantime, Mintos is working towards finalizing a reasonable restructuring solution to expedite the settlement of the remaining pending payments.
We will update you as soon as we have more information.
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Hi, regarding Express Credit Only Zambia loans are suspended. Thank you
https://www.mintos.com/en/loan-originators/expresscredit/#general
Express Credit is suspended but only for loans issued in Zambia.
https://www.mintos.com/en/loan-originators/expresscredit/#general
Interesting observation while I was going through DelfinGroup presentation – https://www.delfingroup.lv/storage/delfingroup-company-presentation-2019-eng.pdf.
It seems that Mintos is creditor in DefinGroup.
What you think about that?
On slide 28. The amount is 18m EUR.
I think you are misreading the information. DelfinGroup finances itself also through Mintos, that is shown on the slide I think.
Having said that, DelfinGroup (ex ExpressCredit SIA) seems to have (although more hidden) connections to Mintos, whether these are still practically relevant I don’t know, however.
I think I got it. Checked mintos statistics for DelfinGroup. The invested amount is 16m. Perhaps, they enroll it as debt in the financial statement.
Update from IDF Eurasia until H1 2020:
https://www.mintos.com/blog/idf-eurasia-kazakhstan-branch-too-onlinekazfinance-reports-revenue-and-income-growth-for-h1-2020/ (see the PDF with details linked on the page)
Cheers guys!
Thanks Christian. Unfortunately they’ve only provided figures for their Kazakhstan subsidiary. Seems OK but we will want to see the results of the whole group (in particular taking into account Russia etc….) We’ve requested those from their investor relations team.
hi,
Always nice to see your data!
Regarding LuteCredit, how do you see the statistics on Mintos in comparison?
currently only 44% of LuteCredit’s loans are current, and about 15% are >30 days late.
44% is a low % also compared to other LO’s, so i’m curious regarding your take on that, also since LuteCredit is highest in your ranking.
for data see: https://www.mintos.com/en/statistics/ (change to %)
Regards,
bjorn
Hi Bjorn, you make a very good point. We are now in a situation where even a very good LO, that showed it’s trustworthiness by paying back investors after the Kosovo problem they had, is not offering decent risk / return. I invest very little because of their excessive 7 day grace period. 18% of Iute’s loans are now in grace period, that means that a so-called 12% loan of Iute is paying less than 10%.
Hi Bjorn. We always find it hard to rely on the Mintos statistics to do that kind of analysis, as the arrears figures often don’t take into things such as loan originators buying back their performing loans (which lowers the % of loans that are stated as performing), the profile of the Mintos funded loans relative to their overall portfolio, and also how their products work. Iute reported that 77% of their loans were in good standing as of 30 June. Only around 30% of their loans are funded by Mintos investors. They suffered higher provisioning costs due to Covid, but they were still able to make a profit in the first half. They provide quarterly updates on their site so it’s possible to keep a pretty close eye on how they are doing.
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Do you think the problem will only be UkrPozyka? Or also the Dinero loans will be suspended? It does frankly make one distrust Mintos owing to the common shareholders.
News are already on Mintos site. Both Finko companies go into suspension and voluntary wind down.
Finko Ukraine loans just went into recovery. I guess Finko UkrPozyka (Ukraine) goes into suspension after almost 3 weeks in pending payments.
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