Recently we’ve been hearing from investors who tell us they’re finding it difficult to find income verified loans on our platform. This has led some to wonder whether loan originations have slowed at Lending Club or whether we’ve changed our standards for income verification.

In fact, neither is the case. Loan issuances are at historic highs: in April 2013 $140,118,275 in loans were facilitated through the Lending Club platform, up nearly 10% from March 2013 and our highest monthly loan issuance ever. In addition we haven’t changed our standards for verifying income; we continue to conduct income verification on over 60% of loans.

So why does it seem like there are “fewer” income verified loans on the platform?

This perception is simply due to extremely high investor demand causing loans to receive 100% investor funding before the borrower income verification process is complete. When a loan receives 100% funding, we remove the listing from the platform. Lending Club is still verifying income prior to issuing a loan – however, the loan is just no longer visible on our platform since it’s reached 100% funding from investors.

By analyzing our historical Download Loan Data file you’ll better understand how income verified loans perform compared to non-income verified loans, as well as gain more insight into what loan factors matter the most.

Please feel free to reach out to us if you have any additional questions, and thank you very much for your understanding and patience as Lending Club grows to meet both investor and borrower demand.

You may have noticed that the number of Notes listed on our Web site has recently been lower than usual.  This is not due to any slowdown in Lending Club's growth -- April will be our largest month yet, with roughly $140 million in loans issued, a 10% increase over March and more than triple our volume in March of last year.  More loans than ever are hitting the platform.

The decrease in visible loans is due to recent record inflow of investors and capital over the past two months (we signed up 2-3 times more new investors last month than average).  This capital is causing loans to be fully committed very quickly after listing -- usually within 24 hours.

We understand and apologize that the limited selection at any one time makes it harder to invest.

Actions we are taking to increase the number of Notes visible on the Platform include:

- We are, where possible, prudently reducing our investor acquisition efforts

- We are spreading larger investments out over time

- We are working on an automated investment tool that will enable you to specify your parameters and have trades executed on your behalf without the need to visit the website.  (We hope to have this ready by late summer.)

In the meanwhile, it may be helpful to know that new loans are listed on the website at 6AM, 10AM, 2PM, and 6PM Pacific Time.  Visiting the website at these times will allow you to see the broadest possible selection.

Thank you for your patience and support of Lending Club.

Over the past year, Lending Club has made additional credit attributes available for loans listed on our platform. Many investors have requested that these same attributes be made available for historical analysis. These attributes are currently available in the download of all issued loans on our Statistics page.

In addition to the over 40 new credit attributes, we’ve added some other relevant data fields – such as the Last Payment Date and Amount, Next Payment Date, date and range of the last Credit Score pull, a breakdown of Principal, Interest, and Late Fees received, as well as Payment Plan and Income Verification flags.

We’ve also synced up the naming conventions of this file with our Browse Notes CSV file (which is a real-time search of loan listings) and the In Funding CSV file (which is updated once-per-day).

Please note that for some of the new credit attributes, you will only see history dating back to March 2012. We’ll be maintaining the previous Issued Loans CSV download format for 120 days here.  We do reserve the right to modify or eliminate listed attributes going forward in our sole discretion.

The full list of data attributes with descriptions can be found in the data glossary. Feel free to email us at data@lendingclub.com if you have any questions.

While thinking about improving your investing, it’s also important to consider tax implications that would impact your overall performance. Here’s why:

Investment returns = (Performance of your investments) - fees - taxes

Put simply, to take home more money, you can improve the performance of your investments, lower fees, and/or lower the amount of taxes you pay on your investments.

Lending Club’s solid returns

We’ve got your back when it comes to providing solid returns on your investments. In the 5 years of Lending Club’s existence, our investors have experienced solid returns. But, they don’t tell the whole story. You may be subject to pay taxes on these gains -- the IRS treats interest from your Lending Club investments as income.

So if you’re looking for a way to further grow your investments, there’s an easy way to both make money via Lending Club and help manage your tax bill: by opening a Lending Club IRA.

Lending Club IRA: Tax Advantaged Growth

The Individual Retirement Account (IRA) was designed to encourage people to save for retirement (see the IRS guide to IRAs). There are many different flavors of IRAs, from Roth to Traditional to SEP – Lending Club supports them all through our partnership with Self Directed IRA Services, Inc., a subsidiary of Horizon Bank. IRAs receive favorable tax treatment from the IRS which means your investments will grow and you won’t have to pay taxes on them while they are in your IRA account.

Any investor with a valid social security number is eligible for an IRA account.

IRAs aren’t tax free -- you’ll either pay taxes before you put your money in them (like with the Roth IRA) or when you withdraw during retirement (like the Traditional IRA). But the point is that they are good vehicles to save for retirement.

As you can see from the chart below, it’s clear how IRAs helps you manage your experience with the Tax Man. As an example, an investor who invests $100,000 and pays taxes each year on the returns could end up with close to $800,000 after 30 years -- not too shabby but nowhere near the nearly $1.6 million that same investment would have returned if he had maintained the investment in an IRA^[*].

As much as we hate paying taxes, in a way, taxes are a good thing -- it means you made money. But understanding how your investments are taxed can mean more money for your account. Lending Club IRAs power long term gains by growing your money with an advantage -- a tax advantage.

How to fund a Lending Club IRA

There are two basic ways you can fund an IRA account with Lending Club.

If you currently have retirement savings in either a 401(k) or IRA, you may be able to allocate funds from your current account to a Lending Club account. Alternatively, you could fund a self-directed IRA account with Lending Club directly with an eligible annual contribution.

If you currently have a 401(k) or IRA with another financial institution:

• IRA Transfers–you can transfer funds from another IRA to fund your investment through Lending Club.^[**]
• 401(k) Rollovers–if you have a retirement plan with a previous employer, you can roll over those funds to a new or existing Lending Club IRA. Our preferred IRA custodian - Self Directed IRA Services, Inc. - offers a fast and easy rollover service.

If you do not currently have a 401(k) or IRA with another financial institution:

• Annual Contribution–you can contribute up to $5,500 per tax year (or $6,500 if you are age 50 or older) to an IRA.^[***]

Questions? Open a Lending Club IRA today

Here’s what to do next if you are interested in learning more about a Lending Club IRA

• Open an account: Start by completing our online application
• Learn more: Check out our Retirement Options Guide
• Questions: Call Investor Services at (888) 596-3159
• Tax advice: Check with your tax advisor and the IRS

We have updated the Browse Notes filters to include 2 new filter options:

• Monthly income filter: You may now filter loans based on a borrower’s monthly gross income.

• Loan ID search: For investors looking for a specific loan to invest in, you can now enter one or multiple loan IDs to search for specific loan listings.

For more information on how to access available filters on Browse Notes, see our earlier post here.