SEC Shuts Down Online Lending Sites

I'm too chicken to try peer-to-peer lending myself, but a lot of people are lending and borrowing money on web sites like Prosper and Loanio.

Unfortunately for those folks, the SEC has issued a cease-and-desist letter to web sites that act as the conduit between individual borrowers and lenders. In SEC Outlines Its Reasoning For Shutting Down P2P Lender Prosper, TechCrunch makes the details of this incident understandable and notes that Lending Club is still up and running for peer-to-peer lending.