4 Financial Investments That Help You Do Some Good in the World

When you invest your money, it's important to put it into investments that will offer you good returns. At the same time, most investors also find it important to allocate funds in ways that make the world a better place. Here are four of the best investments you can make if you want to do some good in the world while earning a solid return on your money.

Invest in Green Energy Stocks

The move away from fossil fuels and toward greener forms of energy will likely produce enormous amounts of value in the coming years and decades. Companies operating in the renewable energy sector are well-positioned to produce large returns while solving one of the fundamental problems of the climate crisis. 

Consider exploring stocks in these companies, as well as those that supply the raw materials required for new energy technologies.

Invest in Small Agriculture

Providing startup money to a small, local farm is one of the best things you can do to make a difference in the world with your investment. Local farms offer nutritious food at reasonable prices, often while practicing more sustainable methods of agriculture. If you're really feeling ambitious, you might even consider buying some land and farming it yourself as a business opportunity.

Buy a Campsite

Although everyone is aware of the merits of real estate investing, most people overlook the potential of campgrounds as sources of income. Owning a campsite allows you to collect tent or RV parking fees on a property that requires minimal hands-on involvement. 

Best of all, campsites allow you to help people get away and relax in nature during their leisure time. These properties can be a bit difficult to find, but a good campsite or RV park broker should be able to help you select the right site.

Get Into Peer-to-Peer Lending

One of the most direct ways to make the world a better place through your investments is to fund loans through peer-to-peer lending. These small loans allow people to fund projects, pursue education, consolidate existing debts, or even start their own small businesses. 

As a peer-to-peer lender, you can personally select the loans you choose to fund, allowing you to help make the lives of others better. This form of lending offers decent returns, often competing with or even slightly exceeding the broader stock market.

These are just a few of the ways in which your investment activities can help make the world a better place. Although it's always important to earn a good return on your investment, you can also gain the satisfaction of doing good while increasing your wealth.

A Starter’s Guide to Nontraditional Investments

While almost everyone is familiar with common investments like stocks, bonds and real estate, there are also a huge number of less common investment vehicles that can help you make the most of your money. 

These so-called nontraditional investments allow investors to diversify their portfolios and earn higher overall returns on their capital. Here are four of the nontraditional investments you need to know about if you’re thinking about broadening your portfolio.

Peer-to-peer Lending

Over the last few years, peer-to-peer lending has emerged as one of the most important classes of nontraditional investments. In peer-to-peer lending, sometimes abbreviated P2P, groups of individual lenders fund loans for borrowers. 

These lenders then receive both their principal and interest as the borrowers repay the loans. Interest rates vary based on the borrower’s creditworthiness but returns of 10 percent or more are not uncommon.

Monetized Websites

Websites are among the most overlooked investment vehicles out there. Sites monetized with ads and affiliate links can generate considerable passive income for their owners, making them a useful inclusion in your wealth management planning for guaranteeing monthly cash flow. 




Best of all, you can buy existing, well-established websites from their creators, meaning you won’t have to set up a site or create all of the content for it yourself. This investment does require a bit of work and maintenance, but it can be very lucrative under the right circumstances.

Cryptocurrency

Digital currencies like Bitcoin, Ether and Dash have become quite popular as investment assets over the last few years. While cryptocurrency investment is certainly speculative, it has produced excellent returns for many investors. 

When it comes to trading cryptocurrency, it helps to have a bit of background knowledge in the more traditional foreign exchange market. Cryptocurrencies may also be a useful hedge against inflation in your portfolio.

Shipping Containers

Oddly enough, one of the investments that can make you a very high rate of return is the common shipping container. By buying shipping containers and then renting them out to shipping and logistics companies through a specialized broker, you can earn considerable rental fees on an asset that isn’t terribly expensive to begin with. 

This form of nontraditional investment does require some fairly specialized knowledge, but it can also produce extremely stable and attractive returns over the long run.

These are just four of the hundreds of nontraditional investments you may want to consider adding to your portfolio. As you continue to learn more about investing, you’ll find many, many other ways to earn returns on your capital. Always be sure to carefully evaluate each investment to make sure it is a good fit for your strategy and risk tolerance level.

Peer to Peer Lending – Instant Access to Funds to Satisfy Urgent Needs!

Peer to peer lending is the loan transactions between person to person. Known otherwise as P2P loans, the option is quite popular and much preferred. There are online companies that offer financial aid to those in need of money for some purpose or the other. The loans for bad credit lenders who get registered with the websites that offer online portals get access to the borrowers who search for financial support through these portals. Since the interest rates are high, many of the investors prefer peer to peer lending as they get higher returns for their investment. 

How does the loan function?

The websites that provide online portals to give access to lenders and borrowers keep updating the list of lenders and borrowers. The contact can be initiated either by the lender or the borrower. The borrower can get the loan from a particular lender after verifying the genuineness of the lender and the lenders can sanction approval for the loan after confirming the reliability and responsibility of the borrower. The loans are approved if the lenders are convinced of the borrowers’ ability to make repayments as agreed. The borrowers who are in need of urgent funds can get financial support through peer to peer lending.

Those who need emergency funds can access peer to peer lending instead of credit card loans for which the interest rates are overwhelming. Peer to peer loans can be opted for various purposes. If you are struggling with uncontrollable credit card dues, you can consider peer to peer loans to ease out the financial crisis. To repair the vehicles and to clear the medical bills, peer to peer loans can be accessed as the support is instant. If you are in need of funds to start a new business or to run the already started venture, you can think of applying for peer to peer lending in which you have the provision to choose the interest rates as per your ability and requirements at http://www.prlog.org/12242820-unsecured-no-credit-check-loans-up-to-3500-from-newly-launched-lending-network.html .

The offer is convenient for those whose loan applications are not approved by conventional banks due to poor credit record. Those with good credit access this offer to avoid unnecessary delay due to the long process involved in traditional loans. The online companies that promote peer to peer lending act as the market for the lenders and the borrowers. The borrowers can mention their requirements and wait for responses from the lenders instead of trying for loans from banks or other financial institutions. The lenders review the applications of the borrowers and approve loans based on the credit record of the borrowers.


The loan amount is determined by the lender. The loan amount can be very minimum and the financial support from various lenders who have registered with the portal will help to get the needed monetary support to serve the purpose for the borrowers. The repayments made by the borrower are distributed proportionally to the lenders who offered funds for this particular borrower. Both the borrowers and the lenders are benefited by the offer of peer to peer lending. The borrowers get instant access to funds and the lenders get higher interest rates for their money. However, the borrowers should be specific about returning the loan amount as agreed.

Here Comes New Ideas for Investment In 2014

After the 2008 financial crisis, lawmakers began searching for new ways to regulate financial industries in hopes of preventing a future crisis. The first step taken to avoid the failings of the previous system was breaking up the Financial Services Authority (FSA) into the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). As a result, investment firms can expect to be more heavily regulated than ever before. Read on to learn about some of the changes expected to begin in 2014.

Investment Management Regulatory Updates for 2014

Firstly, the Office of Fair Trading’s (OFT) guidelines and licensing will be subsumed under the FCA. Any firms currently licensed by the OFT to conduct consumer credit-based business have to apply under the FCA by March 31st, 2014. Firms can apply for interim permission to legally conduct business, which allows them some breathing room for becoming fully compliant with the FCA and PRA. However, any firms that have not obtained interim permission by April 1st, 2014 must become fully authorized by the FCA. Full authorization requires full compliance with FCA and PRA regulations as of April 1st. Therefore, it would be prudent to meet the deadline for temporary permission if a firm is not prepared to comply fully.

Major issues to keep in mind during new investments

There are alternative ways to gain authorization and a couple of circumstances that can lead to exemption but, for the most part, all consumer credit business activities will be affected. Consumers should be aware of a company’s status so that they can make an informed decision about with whom they should be doing business. One commonly cited factor in such a decision is what fees a consumer should expect to pay.

Every business that obtains full FCA authorization as opposed to interim permission will have to pay a one-time authorization fee as well as an annual fee. The topbridgingfinance.co.uk provides full financial advice and provide loan on bridging finance. Addition, depending on what a particular company needs to do to become fully compliant, one can suspect that there will be further costs on the road to such compliancy. And although one cannot pigeonhole all businesses in the financial sector, it is likely that many which have to front the cost of authorization will pass some of the burden onto consumers.

Also, the FCA will begin dividing businesses into high-risk and low-risk categories. As expected, the FCA will monitor high-risk activities much more closely than low-risk activities. Sometime down the line, this could potentially put high-risk businesses in precarious financial and fiduciary constraints. For instance, high-risk businesses have capital requirements that they must meet in order to both continue with their current level of business and to expand it (particularly by gaining new clients).

Low-risk businesses, on the other hand, have no capital requirements and less stringent regulation overall. The following are some examples of high-risk and low-risk business activities:

High-Risk:

• For-profit credit information services
• Credit brokerage
• Peer-to-peer lending
• Debt collection
• For-profit debt adjusting and counseling
• Consumer credit lending with interest (such as credit cards) or fees (like overdrafts)

Low-Risk:

• Non-profit debt adjusting and counseling
• Non-profit credit information services
• Hiring goods such as cars
• Lending and credit brokering activities dealing with goods and non-financial services as the primary focus of the business.

New horizon for investing?

Consequently, very little will change for consumers deciding how to invest their money in 2014.As always, investments dealing with physical goods carry significantly lower risks than dealing with incorporeal debts and credits? Much will also remain unchanged for those choosing to dabble with intangible investments or to take out a new line of credit. These consumers should still be diligent in choosing who to do business with and should also remain up-to-date with what exactly is changing.

Fortunately for consumers, the FCA promises to be the “champion of the consumer.” If they can live up to this lofty goal, consumers can expect to be well-protected from the many investment pitfalls that lead us into a financial crisis in the first place.

Michele Duchet is a graduate of Economics. She has been working partly as a financial advisor for topbridgingfinance.co.uk which is a main bridging finance and loans advisory site.

Understanding the Process of Peer to peer Lending

Loans (Photo credit: zingbot)

With economic sanctions making their way throughout the world, securing a loan, the normal way is not easy. Banks throughout the world have been finding it difficult to give loans to people who have a perfect credit rating.

In case, you have low or average credit rating, securing a loan gets all the more difficult. All these complications and difficulties have led to the evolution of social lending.

Social lending is a lending system which is moderated through internet. Consumers in social lending process borrow money from other people.

Online Social Lending Clubs

• Each new member can register as a borrower or lender in these online social lending clubs.
• Lenders can choose their distinct interest rates while offering loans.
• Lenders make good returns on these online social lending clubs.

Those interested in borrowing from these online social lending clubs are drawn to these peer to peer lending sites as they offer easy loans. However, the annual interest rates can be extremely higher and can go up to 35%.

For those who have a good credit history, peer to peer lending sites is a great way of securing short term loans. Much time is saved as the tedious process of going through the general banking procedures while securing a loan need not be observed.

The popularity of online social lending clubs can be gauged from the fact that these sites have been able to finance half a billion dollar loan in past several years. According to a report published in Slate Magazine, the popularity of these sites continues to grow with each passing year and they have successfully accomplished their real objective.

History of Lending Clubs

Lending clubs own their existence to micro lending movement and the current economic scenario has fuelled the success of these clubs. Most of these lending clubs have come up in recent times.

Entrepreneurs in third world countries have benefitted from social lending site Kiva.org which was the first one to make its presence felt in the business. The site came up with the idea of offering money to the borrowers and to support them in the need of their hour.

Loan Application Process

Peer to peer loans can be sought easily from these lending clubs. A borrower only needs to fill in an application on the lending club’s website. A distinct advantage of using this service is that the borrower will be notified immediately about the interest rate at which the loan would be available.

Investors who wish to offer this loan have a two week’s time to complete all the formalities. As the loan gets funded, the amount is transferred to your account. The first payment on the borrowers part is made a month after the processing of the loan.

All the associated paperwork is managed by the lending club and this makes the repayment process extremely easy to manage. A few states however, have regulatory sanctions in place which restrict the lender from investing money in these sites.

Crosschecking before making investments will work to your advantage and you will reap benefits in the long run.

Peer-To-Peer Lending an Alternative to Big Banking

One of the newest trends happening online is Peer-to-Peer services. This business model of connecting people to people to provide a service is growing more every day. Some examples of peer-to-peer businesses are Airbnb (lodging), Kickstarter (project funding), and TaskRabbit (to-do lists). These companies are growing because they provide services at a personal level. The business model of dealing with large, impersonal companies is no longer your only option. Whether you're choosing a place to vacation, fund your start-up, or borrow money.

Five years ago the peer-to-peer way to borrow money online was started by Internet Company "Lending Club". Lending Club offered an alternative to large commercial banks that scaled back their lending during the financial crisis. They offer to be the middle man between borrowers who couldn't borrow and lenders who were looking to get a higher return on their cash. Lending Club provided the structures to make this happen and they have been successful ever since.

The Internet has made it possible for peer-to-peer businesses to offer their services around the world. UK peer to peer lending company Folk2Folk has a different twist on peer-to-peer lending. They are looking for individuals who are able to lend £25,000 or more. They offer secured loans on non-residential property to individuals and businesses. Folk2Folk does the banks one better by processing a secured loan in seven to ten days. This tops the time that regular banking takes, which is usually is months, to fund a loan. 

We are seeing the future with the growth of Peer-to-peer services. Even Internet giant Google sees the potential of this type of lending. Recently, Google invested $125M in Lending Club in the U.S. while in the U.K. Zopa announced that they are putting in new safeguards to protect lenders funds and Funding Circle starting to do secured loans. With Google's investment, we are seeing peer-to-peer lending services becoming mainstream.