Fitch upgrades Zopa securitisation
A portfolio of securitised Zopa peer-to-peer loans has been upgraded by ratings agency Fitch.
The P2P loans formed part of a 2019 Zopa securitisation worth £244.7m, which was sold by London Bay Loans Warehouse 1 Limited.
Fitch has today reaffirmed its tripe A rating for the securitised A, B and C notes.
It upgraded the D notes from triple B plus to A minus, the E notes went from double B plus to triple B plus and the F notes were upgraded from double B minus to triple B minus.
Fitch said the remaining life default assumptions on the loans remained unchanged, with the average default base case at 9.1 per cent.
It said there was enough liquidity to cover any shortfall from payment holidays and said the portfolio withstood its tougher default assumptions that were revised during the pandemic.
Fitch also highlighted that Zopa was continuing to operate and was able to service loans despite the pandemic.
“Zopa has been working with a hybrid model since 2020 and has systems in place to enable all employees to work remotely,” it said.
“Customer services staff are cross-trained to work in the collections team dealing with less complex activities, freeing up the experienced collections staff to work on more complicated cases.
“Collections have continued to operate as normal, in-house and with one third-party collection agency for deceased accounts only.
“The transaction also has a back-up servicer in the event of servicing termination.”
The securitisation was Zopa’s third and largest deal.
It followed a £138m deal in 2016 and a £208.9m securitisation in 2017.
The platform has since announced its exit from P2P lending as it focuses on its banking brand.