Transparency

Wish I'd thought of taking people's money, giving no guarantee of return or loss of capital or level of risk, stick it in some 12℅ loans, tell the punter I can't possibly reveal exactly where there money is as it's a trade secret, give them 7℅ to keep them sweet and coming back for more, whilst pocketing 5℅ myself, but let's just tell them where taking 1℅ so they don't get upset, if we lose their money then no loss to us we'll still charge them 1℅ for the privelidge of us gambling with their money and blame it on the market and point out there are of course no guarantees

The same people that complain about a drop in rates at say SS to 8-12℅ and decrue they wouldn't touch loans at that rate for that risk, where at least you can try to work out the risk, will equally give there money to receive 7℅ completely blind with no possible way of working out the risk

Bear in mind that there is a 'black box' outside most houses, that goes out every other week for collection...

Fully agree with your sentiments that BM should be treated as a black box account. A leave and forget account - come back in 12 months and there's your 7%. As a relatively new platform it's understandable they will be scrutinized which will obviously work in their favour when performing well but can of course be the reverse when it's not.

Unfortunately from various posts the algorithm seems to have a mind of its own. In some cases it deploys investments at supersonic speed whilst others...... This has been acknowledged by BM and they are working on a remedy. It may be of assistance however if they (temporarily) removed the expectation of deployment in the 7-28 day time frame as clearly this is not working out for many investors. Indeed, they may also consider suspending new investments until they can 'mop up' the excess funds they already hold as once investors decide a platform is not performing as expected and withdraw, they are unlikely to return in the short term.

With hindsight, possibly the 1k minimum was set too high at this stage in their development. Clearly BM are unable to satisfy many investors with their current deal flow level.

It's largely an irrelevance IMO whether I'm 10% or 90% invested provided at the end of 12 months then the 7% is achieved. In my case I have a total of 23 active investments within my portfolio with 32% of these showing as 1 month loans so these will be falling off soon and need replacing.

At this moment in time however they seem to be in the over promising and under delivering category rather than the reverse. Irrespective I still believe they have an excellent product which possibly jumped the gun and until they truly get up to speed may alienate a few investors on their journey.

I believe BM is an excellent concept and they are working hard to achieve their aims so deserve to succeed although unfortunately it may not be with their current intake of investors.   

Have you seen your detailed list of loans (receivables agreements) via your dashboard, or your returns statements on your dashboard?

Please let me know if you think there is more you would like to see, that you aren't currently seeing.

I'm really really confused by the tone taken with Bondmason by some.

There seems to be a constant stream of judgement on time to 100% investment, XIRR calculations being done after 1month or 2, claiming there is too much secrecy, arguing they are just offering what other sites do for a fee.

Well very simply, who cares how long it takes to full investment or what xirr is after 47days .... if the interest after a yr is as promised 7% or thereabouts then fantastic!! It's p2p, there is risk involved despite their expertise, if a default drops this a little so be it.

It's a deposit and leave them to it format, they provide enough information to give you a great indication of what's going on even though they really don't have to. Given some of the comments they'd be better not bothering. If you want to know exactly where every penny is .... ummm do it yourself?

Finally if you think other sites provide a higher rate for doing it yourself and the fee is a total waste of your money then great, Bondmason isn't for you, but doesn't mean it isn't the perfect solution for others.

stevefindlay has been staggeringly impressive in responding to queries, issues and general bondmason chit-chat .... give the guy a break!

stevio - "Your [sic] re-packaging P2P loans, claiming superior expertise and knowledge in picking them, but won't share the results of which loans you have diligently selected, so make it impossible for anyone to test this and simply have to accept your word on it."

Please see www.bondmason.com/statistics for aggregated analysis, or your own individual dashboard for individual loan level details.

" I find you quite confrontational and aggressive by challenging my 'bravery'" ... "I didn't term it fraud, you did, I would call it clever marketing. I commend you in your sales tactics and ability and you have come up with a novel and lucrative way to make money from lenders"

I'm sorry, but your assertion was clear: you implied that we make loans at 12% and take a 5% skim but report that we only take a 1% fee. To do that would be a lie and be fraudulent. We don't do this. If you find my response to this point robust - I make no apologies - I find your comments offensive.  

However, there are a few platforms out there that do take a 5% skim, so maybe you'd prefer to give those a try.

"I don't have any need too as I don't see any value in your platform."

Then please stop wasting your time on our forum board.

Do any forum mods want to have a read of this conversation??

I for one highly value the participation of site reps and even more so CEOs.

I suspect throwing unfounded and inflammatory allegations at them isn't the way to get them so stick around .... 😠

My purpose in starting this thread was not to use it as some form of negative comment on BM.

Clearly from recent posts, there is some sort of issue around transparency, so I was hoping that this thread would help to define what the issue really is, from useful replies here.

As you say you are not sure yourself what the issue really is.

If we are not really sure of the issue how can we respond to it ?

So I was hoping for positive constructive replies that could be seriously considered as a way of providing more transparency and thereby resolving concerns that people had expressed recently.

Unfortunately following some initial useful posts, it seems to have turned into some sort of personal boxing match and this will get us nowhere at all.

Hopefully at the start of the working week, this thread will see more rational and constructive replies which was my original intent.

As you say, sensible communication is really the easiest way ahead here, but everyone needs to be clear at the outset as to what the issue really is and then we can look to see how it may be resolved to the satisfaction of all parties.