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Today, we’re honored and excited to again be recognized by the Webby Awards and accept

• an Official Honoree designation in the Banking/Bill Paying category
• a nomination in the Financial Services category. This year's polls just opened up and are only open until the end of the month (April 30th), so please cast your vote. We need your support! Please help us add another one to last year's win (pictured below).

We are happy to report that our offering was cleared by the State of New Hampshire yesterday morning. Lenders who are New Hampshire residents can now buy notes from Lending Club. We have set up a big map in our office that shows weekly progress as state approvals trickle in - here is the smaller version of it:

Other states already cleared include Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Louisiana, Minnesota, Mississippi, Montana, Nevada, New York, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Utah, West Virginia, Wisconsin and Wyoming. We are hoping to keep adding a few states each week for the next few weeks as we get clearance from state authorities, and will post regular updates and notify members directly as the list grows longer.

Keep in mind that state limitations do not apply to the Note Trading Platform operated by FOLIOfn, and all lenders can buy or sell Notes among themselves irrespective of their state of residence.

The Notes are offered by Prospectus.

For some of the latest details on Lending Club including on the reactivated growth we’ve seen since reopening our platform last week (offering Notes by Prospectus), and thoughts on how our new secondary market now empowers people with even more ways to do things that previously only banks and other corporate financial entities could do, check out recent discussions Renaud’s had with Yahoo! Finance, The Wall Street Journal, NuWire Investor and Fox Business.

We announced back in April that we were starting a registration process with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that required us to go into a quiet period. Thank you all for your feedback and support during that period.

Today, we’re delighted to announce that we have completed this process and are now available to both borrowers and lenders. We believe that this SEC registration is a major step forward for the Lending Club community and social lending in general, as it helps establish the space as a investment alternative to the traditional debt instruments and credit products offered by large financial institutions.

What does this registration mean for you, the lenders and borrowers?

• Under the registered offering, Lending Club lenders will now invest in notes that correspond to portions of loans made to borrower members. The notes have stated interest rates ranging from 6.69 percent to 18.63 percent, after a 1 percent service charge is applied.
• By partnering with FOLIOfn Investments, Inc., a registered broker dealer, Lending Club becomes the first social lending network where lenders have the option of a trading platform. On the trading platform, lenders who become customers of FOLIOfn will be able to put notes up for sale in the event they need liquidity before the completed term of a note.
• We believe this will accelerate the mainstream adoption of social lending, which will help more borrowers get funded faster.

The current financial crisis is creating mounting consumer distrust of large financial institutions and causing people to demand an alternative that gives them more control over their personal finances and investments. Lending Club is leading the charge to deliver that alternative by providing a network where lenders can fund loans posted by borrowers.

The Lending Club community has continued to show exceptionally responsible borrowing behavior over the last 18 months, demonstrated by the fact that since May 2007 the default rate has remained lower than 2 percent.

At a time when the financial landscape makes our community even more useful to both lenders and borrowers, we are thrilled to be able to accept new lenders again.

The prospectus filed with the SEC is available here.

We’ve all been lured into a store with the promise of an unbelievably low price, only to find out that a mail-in rebate was involved. In many cases, the rebate makes the offer seem so good that we decide to make the purchase, but we really shouldn’t count on that discounted price until our rebate check is actually in our hands.

Rebates are similar to gift cards in that manufacturers expect a certain portion of them to go unused. Even out of those that do get returned, some will have incorrect or incomplete information rendering them ineligible for a payout. Rebates may also get you to spend more, since your reduced price on the rebated item may lead you to believe that you have some extra money to spend.

It sounds obvious, but reading and complying with the rules of a rebate will make it much more likely that you actually get paid. I take rebates into consideration when making purchasing decisions, but I consider it both ways. First, I look at the price assuming that I’ll never see a dime from the rebate. Then I look at it as though I will certainly get the rebate. In the past, I’ve passed up a slightly lower price, including a rebate, for an alternative that wouldn’t entail the hassle and risk of the rebate. I feel okay doing this for, say, a $5 difference on a $100 item, but would be more inclined to go with the rebated item if the difference were greater.

Rebates offer a price incentive, but it comes at a cost. While the work of getting a rebate is usually fairly simple, waiting for your money can be a pain. If you are too busy to handle a rebate in a timely manner, or if there’s some other factor that may prevent you from receiving your money, comparison-shop as if the rebate didn’t exist. That way, if you do end up getting the rebate, it will be like a little bonus that you could use to treat yourself to a small indulgence or apply in an even better way such as debt reduction or another investment.