A report from The Times of London in the UK. "A week before the collapse of Lendy, the chief executive of Barclays business banking gave a warning of what might be in store for peer-to-peer lending. Platforms linking ordinary investors and business borrowers were exposing people to poor-quality debts, Ian Rand, 49, said. There were, he added, 'a lot of people that banks wouldn’t lend to who went to Wonga instead. That didn’t work out too well for them or for Wonga. I am nervous that we could be going down the same path with business lending.'"

"His comments, made in an interview with a business website on May 16, turned out to be prescient. About 22,000 investors are now nervously awaiting news of how much of the more than £160 million of their money might be recovered after the Lendy collapse."

"Not that it was much of a surprise for those investors who had closely followed events in recent months. Like watching a 'slow-motion car crash' is how one described the insolvency of a business that has been plagued by late-paying borrowers."

"For most of its existence it has been dogged by questions over the quality of its borrowers, how it handles defaults and the quality of its management. Prospective investors were told that they could invest 'with complete peace of mind.' While more realistic risk warnings appeared eventually, investors were reassured that 'lending is always secured with a legal charge and our loan amounts do not exceed 70 per cent of the open market value.'"

"When loans went bad, these valuations sometimes turned out to be wildly optimistic. By November last year about 60 per cent of its loan book had fallen behind on repayments. Investors should brace themselves for a significant hit."

"Andrea Hall is one of the thousands of investors waiting to see how much money might be salvaged from the collapse of Lendy. The marketing consultant from Reading invested £10,000 in July last year. 'I’d sold a property in Spain because of Brexit and wanted to reinvest the money,' she said."

"She was attracted to Lendy, which is not covered by the scheme that guarantees up to £85,000 of deposits. Ms Hall, 54, said that she had been reassured by Lendy’s website. 'They basically said, 'Don’t worry, if they can’t repay we’ve got the property.'"

"She spread her money across ten loans. By the start of this year, only two were performing safely within terms. She withdrew as much as she could — about £1,000 — but said that she relaxed a little when Liam Brooke, Lendy’s founder and chief executive, wrote to investors at the end of March. He acknowledged a 'significant rise in borrower defaults,' but said that 'the business is in a more robust position than it has been' and that governance, financial controls, liquidity, compliance and recoveries were being strengthened."

"Ms Hall said: 'I thought, ‘I don’t need to worry about this.' Now I’m thinking, 'How can you go from hero to zero in a matter of months?'"