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By Daniel Brenner, Senior Editor Updated 2026-06-08 How we rate →

Press & Research Resources

For journalists, researchers, bloggers, and industry analysts covering European peer-to-peer (P2P) lending. The materials below are free to use with attribution. Citation guide, contact details, and a summary of our most-citable findings are all on this page.

Quick contact for press: editorial@crowdindex.org - typical response within 24 business hours. For deadline-driven enquiries (under 4 hours), put “DEADLINE: [time]” in the subject line and we will prioritise.

What CrowdIndex is

CrowdIndex is an editorial team based in the European Union that reviews 19 European P2P investment platforms. Each platform has a research dossier built from 33 to 57 sources per platform - regulators, audits, court filings, investigative journalism, platform disclosures, and community sentiment.

Our coverage is affiliate-supported, which is disclosed on every page of the site. The Editor’s Pick (Maclear) is a paying commercial partner. We do not operate a P2P platform of our own. We are not a regulated investment adviser and nothing on the site is investment advice.

For full background see About CrowdIndex and our Methodology.

Geographic scope: EU member states, Switzerland, United Kingdom, and North America for benchmarking. Russia and CIS jurisdictions are explicitly out of scope.

Update cadence: Dossiers are reviewed quarterly. Regulator alerts and breaking platform news are added to the relevant dossier within 5 business days of verification.

How to cite us

We make the citation easy because we want to be cited correctly. Pick whichever form fits your publication.

Single-sentence attribution

Source: CrowdIndex editorial research - https://crowdindex.org/methodology/

Standard inline citation

Per CrowdIndex’s [Platform Name] dossier - an editorial research file built from 33-57 sources per platform with affiliate partnerships disclosed - [the specific finding].

Linked back to: https://crowdindex.org/platforms/[slug]/

Academic-style citation

CrowdIndex Editorial Team (2026). “[Dossier title].” Retrieved [date] from https://crowdindex.org/platforms/[slug]/

Image/screenshot use

Screenshots of our score tables, regulator-status mappings, or risk badges may be reproduced freely with a visible attribution line (“Source: CrowdIndex - crowdindex.org”) in the caption. No prior permission needed.

Most-citable findings

These are concrete, verified, and ready to use. Every one of them is sourced and can be traced through the corresponding dossier. Pick what is useful for your story.

1. Maclear Vibroedil default (July 2025)

The first publicly documented case of a Swiss self-regulatory-organisation-supervised P2P platform CEO covering investor losses out of personal funds in a default scenario.

  • Italian SME borrower defaulted on a €150K loan in July 2025
  • Three-month silence between default and platform disclosure (October 2025)
  • CEO Aleksandr Ustjev (Maclear Switzerland) covered investor losses personally
  • Implication: Maclear’s marketed “collateral system” was untested in an actual default until this case
  • Full source-cite trail in the Maclear dossier

This is the case Lars Wrobbel covered as “Investors at Risk” in early 2026, but our dossier has the primary regulator filings, the CEO statement, and the Italian commercial court records.

Eight of the 19 European platforms we cover have structural ownership conflicts where platform ownership materially overlaps loan originator ownership. This is not a hidden pattern - it is the default mode for the sector.

The eight: PeerBerry / Aventus Group, Lendermarket / Creditstar, Crowdpear / PeerBerry (Stražnickas family), Hive5 / Hive5 Group, Nectaro / Dyninno, Twino / FINKO holding, Loanch / Fingular (Cashwagon CEO ownership), and Mintos partially (historical, post 2022 partially divested).

Source: each platform’s individual dossier in /platforms/ plus our cross-platform analysis. This finding is structural and citable as fact.

3. Regulator status mapping (first public, all 19)

We have published the first cross-platform mapping of all 19 European P2P platforms to their actual current regulatory status. The summary is below; the per-platform detail is in each dossier.

  • MiFID II / investment-firm regulated with investor compensation (4): Mintos (Latvia), Indemo (Latvia), Nectaro (Latvia), Twino (Latvia)
  • ECSP-licensed under EU Regulation 2020/1503 (no investor compensation scheme, only operational rules) (11): InRento, Profitus, EstateGuru, Capitalia, Robocash, Crowdpear, Lendermarket, Reinvest24, InSoil (HeavyFinance), Debitum, plus partial: PeerBerry
  • Swiss SRO supervision via PolyReg (AML scope only, not banking, not investor compensation) (1): Maclear
  • Unregulated or hybrid (3): Hive5, Scramble, Loanch

Source: cross-checked against regulator public registers (Latvijas Banka, Lietuvos Bankas, BaFin, AMF, ESMA register, FINMA, EFSA, CNMV). Per platform: see individual dossier “Regulation” section.

4. Default and recovery statistics (audited where possible)

Default rates and recovery statistics for 18 of 19 platforms, cross-checked against at least three independent sources per platform.

Selected comparable data points:

  • EstateGuru: 60.2% of cumulative portfolio (€939M) currently in active recovery (per platform 2024 annual report and EFSA quarterly disclosures)
  • InRento: 0.0% default rate as of Q1 2026 with €322K cumulative loans funded (the only zero-default platform in our universe)
  • Maclear: 0.15% default rate on €99.6M AUM (single Vibroedil case, see finding #1)
  • Mintos: Realised investor yield 8.2% vs marketed average yield range of 10-12% (per Karsten Aichholz analysis 2024 + our verification)
  • Debitum: 34¢ insider margin per loan on insider-originated portfolio per Karsten Aichholz investigation March 2026; we verified through Estonian commercial court filings

5. Trust-tier framework (T1-T4)

We classify the 19 platforms into four trust tiers based on regulator status, audit transparency, conflict-of-interest structure, and track-record durability. Full framework in Trusted Platforms framework.

  • Tier 1 (7): PeerBerry, InRento, Robocash, Nectaro, Capitalia, Crowdpear, Indemo
  • Tier 2 (5): Mintos, Maclear, Lendermarket, EstateGuru, Profitus
  • Tier 3 (3): Hive5, InSoil, Twino
  • Tier 4 (4): Debitum, Reinvest24, Scramble, Loanch

This is editorial judgement applied to documented criteria - the criteria themselves are public.

6. Affiliate ecosystem cartography

We have mapped the Targetcircle affiliate network exposure for European P2P - approximately 3,000 finance publishers active in the EU and North America. Findings include:

  • Maclear’s two-channel acquisition model (premium agencies plus self-service Targetcircle) confirmed across two independent data sources
  • Carmen Corral is the top-1 Maclear publisher with €43,966 cumulative commission as of May 2026
  • Mintos operates a two-channel model (public Impact.com affiliate plus private deals via promo codes such as WEALTH26)

These are commercially sensitive findings that platforms rarely confirm publicly. We sourced through publisher dashboard exports rather than through platform disclosures.

7. Press coverage statistics

Across the 19 platforms in our universe, we documented 485 published articles in the period 2019-2026:

  • Only 15% are tier-1 mainstream press (Bloomberg, Reuters, Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Handelsblatt)
  • 31% are industry media (AltFi, Crowdfund Insider, etc.)
  • 38% are independent blogs and influencer reviews
  • 15% are press releases or regulatory alerts

InRento has the highest tier-1 ratio (9 tier-1 publications including a Fortune CEO profile). Maclear has zero tier-1 mainstream coverage, which is itself a citable structural finding about Swiss SRO-only platforms.

Brand assets

All files are SVG vector format (scale to any size without quality loss) and free to use with attribution.

Logos:

Infographics (free to embed with attribution):

Press kit PDF:

Editorial team portraits:

Tagline copy:

  • One-line summary of CrowdIndex: “Editorial review of 19 European P2P lending platforms with 33 to 57 sources per platform, affiliate partnerships disclosed.”
  • Short-form: “CrowdIndex - editorial research on European P2P investment platforms.”

If you need a different format (high-resolution PNG, EPS, AI), email us and we will produce it within 48 hours.

About the editorial team

CrowdIndex is built by a nine-person editorial team. Senior coverage is led by:

  • James Thornton - CEO and Founder, ex-Bloomberg, ex-NerdWallet (Rotterdam)
  • Daniel Brenner - Senior Editor, ex-Handelsblatt, ex-N26 (Frankfurt)
  • Lucia Marchetti - Head of Research, ex-Borsa Italiana, ex-Morningstar (Milan)

Full team bios with prior employer details, current vacancies, and conflict-of-interest disclosures are on the Team page.

Permissions at a glance

Use casePermission required
Citing specific dossier finding with attribution✅ Free, no permission
Reproducing short excerpt (under 100 words) with attribution✅ Free, no permission
Embedding our methodology link as reference✅ Free, no permission
Quoting a CrowdIndex team member by name✅ Free if quote is accurate; we appreciate a heads-up email
Screenshots of our score tables or risk badges✅ Free with visible attribution
Reproducing entire dossier or extracts over 500 words⚠️ Contact us first - typically granted within 24 hours
Re-publishing our content under a different byline❌ Not permitted
Translating our content for re-publication⚠️ Contact us first

Disclosures we want you to be aware of

  • Affiliate revenue. We earn affiliate commissions from some of the platforms we list, including our Editor’s Pick (Maclear), which is a paying commercial partner. This affects which platforms we list and how they are ranked. These rankings are not independent. The disclosure is on every page that contains affiliate links.
  • No banking licence, no investor compensation scheme. We do not provide investment advice and our coverage of platforms does not constitute a recommendation to invest. P2P lending puts capital at risk.
  • No editorial paid placement. We do not accept payment to write, modify, or remove individual dossier content. Sponsored content (if we ever publish it) will be clearly labelled. The Editor’s Pick position is a commercial partnership disclosed publicly - it is not paid editorial content.

Speak to a researcher

For deeper requests - source bundles, primary regulator documents, anonymised affiliate-program data, regulator interview tips - email editorial@crowdindex.org with subject “RESEARCH REQUEST: [topic]” and we will route you to the analyst with the strongest knowledge of that area.

Typical response time: under 24 business hours. For investigative deadlines, mark “DEADLINE: [time]” in the subject and we will prioritise.