Imagine a 28-year-old living in a shared flat in East London, renting because it would take ten years to save the deposit for a one-bedroom apartment, working at a job that pays a respectable salary but not enough to feel secure, carrying a student loan balance that hardly moves despite monthly repayments, and being informed by every traditional financial institution that their credit file is, in essence, too thin to be useful. There are a ton of those people in the UK right now. Furthermore, more and more of them are not waiting for the high street bank to reconsider their position.
Since it first emerged in Britain about 20 years ago, the peer-to-peer lending industry has been expanding, and the generational statistics supporting this recent expansion are striking rather than unexpected. In a survey of 2,000 people, Opinium for ThinCats found that millennials in the UK are four times more likely than those over 55 to have money invested through P2P platforms. One percent of the older cohort and four percent of the younger one.
| Detail | Information |
|---|---|
| What is P2P lending? | A direct lending model connecting individual lenders and borrowers online, cutting out traditional banks and offering higher returns to lenders and faster access to credit for borrowers |
| Millennial P2P participation | 4% of millennials have money invested in P2P platforms vs 1% of over-55s (ThinCats / Opinium, 2,000-person survey) |
| Why millennials prefer P2P | 29% cite cutting out banks · 28% attracted to lending directly to businesses · 23% had P2P recommended by a friend |
| Willingness to try new asset classes | 51% of millennials willing to try new investments — more than twice the 24% rate among over-55s |
| Key UK P2P platforms | ThinCats · The Money Platform (FCA-licensed, loans £250–£1,000, open banking integration) · easyMoney |
| The Money Platform model | Loans funded by individuals, not banks · 0.7%–0.8% interest per day · £1.5 million fundraise · processing £500,000/month by early 2020 |
| Young investor barriers | Average 18–24-year-old owes £2,989 (excl. student loans/mortgages) · 37% have taken out loans via cards or overdrafts |
| Auto-enrollment pension context | ~£90 billion invested in private pensions (latest tax year) · 21% of employees don’t know their pension’s value |
| Equity finance shift | 71% of under-35 business owners would consider equity finance vs 44% of older peers — a “Dragon’s Den-style” cultural shift from bank debt (Albion Ventures, YouGov, 1,014 UK SMEs) |
Although that difference may seem insignificant in absolute terms, it’s important to pay attention to it as a generational signal, especially when you consider that only 24% of people over 55 say they are willing to try new asset classes altogether, compared to 51% of millennials. Young British adults’ perspectives on where and why money is spent are changing structurally.
The explanations offered by millennials for their preference for peer-to-peer communication are frank and unlikely to have been staged in a focus group. Cutting out banks was mentioned as the sector’s greatest attraction by 29% of respondents. Twenty-eight percent expressed approval of the concept of making direct loans to companies. In a world where financial advice is disseminated through social networks rather than bank branches, the fact that nearly 25% had the platforms recommended to them by a friend is not insignificant. They’re not looking for exotic returns. They are people who have had enough unpleasant experiences with conventional credit systems to search elsewhere and discover something that, at least in theory, makes more sense.
According to Joshua Graham, CEO of The Money Platform, a London-based P2P lender that obtained its license through the FCA’s Project Innovate Incubator, traditional credit bureaus treat millennials unfairly in structural rather than personal ways. Without a fixed address for at least five years, the majority of millennials rent well into their thirties.
They are more likely to switch jobs. They steer clear of credit cards. In a credit-scoring system based on disparate generational norms, all three of those behaviors—which make perfect sense given the economics of early adulthood in 2020s Britain—register as warning signs. For this cohort, the Money Platform developed its own algorithm. A regulator’s approval, two years of development, loans between £250 and £1,000, and full funding from other people rather than institutional capital. The platform was handling half a million pounds every month by the beginning of 2020.
The P2P trend is more difficult to write off as a fad due to the larger economic context. The national youth unemployment rate for November 2025 to January 2026 was 16%, up from 14.5% a year earlier. In London, where entry-level hospitality jobs have decreased and the amounts needed for a house deposit have exceeded most reasonable savings timelines, the number is even higher. StepChange, a charity that manages debt, estimates that 25% of people between the ages of 18 and 24 are experiencing financial difficulties. Without accounting for mortgages or student loans, the average person in that age group owes £2,989, and wage growth is at its slowest pace since late 2020.
The tension at the heart of it all is difficult to ignore. Young people are clearly interested in investing; according to an Investment Association survey, Gen Z and millennials are the two biggest demographics thought to be most likely to want to invest in the future. However, only 22% of those surveyed were aware that they could start with less than £50. Both access and knowledge are lacking, and the organizations that could supply them have mostly turned their attention elsewhere. With approximately £90 billion going into private pensions in a recent tax year, the auto-enrollment pension reform of 2012 subtly turned millions of young workers into investors without their knowledge. However, employee engagement with these pensions is still low, with 21% of workers not knowing how much their pot is worth.
Another gap is filled by P2P lending. In contrast to pension fund allocation, it is readable. You can see where the funds are spent. You know what the return entails. That level of transparency is not insignificant for a generation navigating financial complexity without much institutional support. Maybe that’s the whole point. It’s still genuinely unclear if the industry develops into something mainstream or stays a respected niche. However, the millennials who are already involved don’t appear to be very motivated to return.
