Mr. Peter O'Mahony:

There are no restrictions in place that would be a barrier to this sector growing. What happened with funding, certainly in the UK, was the ideal way for the Government to support the sector. In terms of what happened, this time last year Funding Circle was lending at a rate of ST£1 million per week. Five weeks after the Government started participating and lending through the site, that had increased to ST£5 million per week; there was a five-fold increase. It was like getting a stamp of approval from the Government but in the biggest way possible, which was that the Government had sufficient confidence in the system to be lending public money.