Ranger Direct defaults increase in third quarter
THE PERCENTAGE of overdue or defaulted loans in the Ranger Direct Lending investment trust portfolio ticked up in the third quarter, with most still coming from its property exposure.
A portfolio update from the alternative-finance focused fund, representing performance in the three months to September showed of 8,076 current investments, 679 were late and 305 were in default, accounting for 12 per cent of loans.
This was up from almost 10 per cent in June 2017.
Read more: Property loans dominating Ranger Direct defaults
The London-listed fund reported $20.7m (£15.2m) of loans in default as at 30 September 2017, with 79 per cent of the value coming from real estate investments.
Another 17 per cent came from business loans and invoice factoring, while four per cent was from consumer loans.
Despite having the highest value of defaults, only 11 actual loans, out of 102 current investments, were in the process of being called in.
In contrast, 257 consumer loans were in default out of 7,170 current investments.
Its overall performance for the quarter was 1.05 per cent, down from 1.73 per cent in the second quarter.
The investment trust’s performance has been hit by the ongoing Princeton legal dispute as well as underperformance in its peer-to-peer platform holdings.
It said in a stock market announcement last November that it is looking at new partners to assist the current management.
It is currently trading at a discount to net asset value of 28 per cent.