Giles Andrews: How I beat the system with my own bank

Giles Andrews, CEO of Zopa, the world's first peer-to-peer loan website, explains how he set out to revolutionise consumer banking.

Many savers would be happy enough with a 7.5% annual return and that's the average earned by investors using Zopa, the world's first peer-to-peer loan website.

David Nicholson came up with the idea in 2004 as a cross between "eBay and the corporate bond market", current CEO Giles Andrews recalls. Nicholson had quit his job at Egg financial services a year earlier, along with two colleagues. He "saw how the bond market transformed corporate finance", says Giles. It allowed investors to compete with banks and lowered borrowing costs for companies. "The idea was to use personal credit checks to do the same for consumer banking." Meanwhile, eBay the biggest online marketplace at the time made him realise that lenders could bid for the interest rate they would charge borrowers.

Subscribe to MoneyWeek

Subscribe to MoneyWeek today and get your first six magazine issues absolutely FREE

Get 6 issues free
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/mw70aro6gl1676370748.jpg

Sign up to Money Morning

Don't miss the latest investment and personal finances news, market analysis, plus money-saving tips with our free twice-daily newsletter

Don't miss the latest investment and personal finances news, market analysis, plus money-saving tips with our free twice-daily newsletter

Sign up
James McKeigue

James graduated from Keele University with a BA (Hons) in English literature and history, and has a certificate in journalism from the NCTJ. James has worked as a freelance journalist in various Latin American countries.He also had a spell at ITV, as welll as wring for Television Business International and covering the European equity markets for the Forbes.com London bureau. James has travelled extensively in emerging markets, reporting for international energy magazines such as Oil and Gas Investor, and institutional publications such as the Commonwealth Business Environment Report. He is currently the managing editor of LatAm INVESTOR, the UK's only Latin American finance magazine.