A challenge for all players in the growing alternative finance space in 2016 will be tackling financial apathy amongst the UK population, a finance expert has claimed.

Writing for Crowdfund Insider, former Square Mile fund manager Karteek Patel cites recent research revealing UK respondents’ apathetic attitude to their own financial affairs. 40 per cent of those polled have never changed their pension provider; 21 per cent have never changed their bank; and a third have left stocks and shares to their own devices after purchase, failing to trade for better returns.

Asked why they weren’t more agile with their finances, 35 per cent reported suffering with “financial apathy”, while 28 per cent admitted they don’t follow their investments or the markets for competing products.

By contrast, data from the pan-European investment bank Liberum shows that direct lending from the UK’s rising peer-to-peer lender platforms has been steadily growing year on year, while industry figures reveal substantial growth in the amounts lent to SMEs through these platforms, a trend that has been buoyed by an influx of institutional money.

Peer-to-peer lending is still growing, retail investors remain keen to get involved, and the amount of money being invested is expanding; yet according to Liberum’s data, more than 50 per cent of the UK population fears that P2P is a riskier option than investing in the stock market.

According to Patel, more needs to be done to dispel concerns in the retail investor community about P2P platforms by demonstrating that alternative investing is not necessarily riskier than other types of investment and indeed offers excellent returns.