Hive5 Review
- Written by
- Just P2P
- •
- Updated November 23, 2025
Hive5 is a peer-to-peer (P2P) lending platform on which private investors place their capital alongside lending companies from the Hive Finance Group. Together, these investors and companies provide business and personal loans, in return for which investors receive monthly interest payments.
Although Hive5 was launched recently, this P2P platform has experienced relatively rapid growth thanks to its attractive rates. Investors have also shown interest in its positioning in known and mature European markets, such as Spain, Poland and Romania.
Let’s perform the review of Hive5.
Table des matières
What is Hive5 ?
Hive5 is a peer-to-peer lending platform based in Croatia that connects investors with subsidiaries from UAB Hive Finance, a financial group based in Latvia. Starting from 10€, investors have the possibility to finance different types of loans with various returns and receive monthly interest payments according to the predetermined schedules.
Company Hive5 marketplace d.o.o
Hive5 Marketplace d.o.o. is a limited liability company established in May 2022, with its headquarters in Zagreb, Croatia (like Robocash). The platform is registered in the official company registry under the Identification Number (OIB) 76871072832 and the European Unique Identifier (EUI) HRSR.081441259.
The P2P platform Hive5 was established to conduct financial service activities with an initial capital of 20,000 kuna (2,654.46 euros) by Hive Finance UAB, a holding company registered in Vilnius, Lithuania. Its purpose is to facilitate connections between the group’s loan originators and individual investors in Europe.
Platform founders
Andrius Rupšys is an electronics engineer with degrees from Vilnius University and Stanford University in the United States. After working as International Sales Director at Teltonika, he founded Ruptela (fleet management and GPS tracking solutions) in 2007. In 2015, he received the “CEO of the Year” award from Dalia Grybauskaitė, President of Lithuania.
Seeing the difficulties his clients faced when obtaining loans from banks, he identified an opportunity to offer alternative FinTech financing. In 2021, he founded Hive Finance and Hive5 with Ricardas Vandzinskas, his Chief Financial Officer.
In 2025, Ricardas Vandzinskas left Hive Finance and sold his 35% stake to Ruptela Group. As a result, Andrius Rupšys now owns all of Hive Finance: 65% personally and 35% through Ruptela Group, where he is also the main shareholder. He continues to lead the strategic and operational direction of the group.
Management team
Initially, the founders took turns serving as CEO. Since then, the organization has evolved: Ricardas Vandzinskas stepped down from executive roles and Andrius Rupšys is now Chairman of the Board. In 2025, two new executives joined the team in key strategic positions.
Aurimas Kačinskas, CEO, is responsible for structuring internal operational processes, consolidating governance, and developing new markets, particularly in Romania. Aurimas spent most of his career at Creditinfo, a company that assesses credit risk for businesses and individuals.
Aleksejus Tonkich, CFO, handles the traditional responsibilities of this role (financial oversight, reporting, profitability) as well as strategic planning and governance leadership responsibilities. Aleksejus brings over 25 years of experience in the financial and banking sector (Bank of Lithuania and Medicinos Bankas).
Aurimas Kačinskas
Aleksejus Tonkich
Hive5 statistics | September 2025
Here are some statistics for the current year:
- Total funds invested : 132,17 M€
- Total interests paid to investors : 3,40 M€
- Average annual return : 14.00%
- Number of investors : +27,500
Hive5 began listing P2P lending investment opportunities in early 2023, slightly less than a year after its inception. This period allowed the company to focus on establishing the IT infrastructure. Since then, the platform has been issuing around 5M€ in new investment opportunities each month.
On the statistics page, investors have access to funded volumes and their distribution among loan originators, as well as different types of loans and their status. It would be nice to also have the number of registered investors, and the interest paid, as well as more detailed statistics for each loan originator.
How does Hive5 work ?
Hive5 is a peer-to-peer investment platform connecting investors with European lending companies (Spain, Romania) offering opportunities to participate in their business activities in exchange for interest payments. The platform acts as an intermediary in the sale of claim rights between private investors (individuals and companies) and these loan originators.
Hive5 is a P2P marketplace
As a P2P platform, Hive5 bridges the gap between capital seekers and providers. The platform serves as a marketplace where lending companies can secure funding for their daily operations across different regions in Europe, while ensuring all parties adhere to regulatory and contractual obligations.
For lending companies, Hive5 presents an opportunity to diversify their funding sources. By showcasing their loan offerings on the platform, these originators can attract capital to fuel their business expansion, strengthen their market position, and scale their lending activities in their respective countries.
The platform enables individual investors to build their portfolio by choosing from various lending opportunities based on their investment criteria : duration, returns and size. These investments generate monthly interest payments which investors can either reinvest into new loans or withdraw to their accounts.
Chronology of a P2P investment
On Hive5, the minimum amount that investors can place in a claim right is 10€, knowing that the returns offered start from 12% and go up to 13%, and the duration of loans ranges between 30 days and 6 months. Interest payments are transferred to investors on a monthly basis whatever the duration.
A loan can be overdue for up to 60 days past its scheduled final payment date. At this point, the loan originator automatically implements the buyback obligation and repurchases the loan from investors.
During this 60-day buyback period, investors continue to earn interest under the original investment conditions. When buyback occurs, the loan originator redeems the investment, crediting both the principal and all accrued interest for the entire period to the investor’s balance.
Investing on Hive5
Who can invest ?
To invest on Hive5, investors must be at least 18 years old and possess a bank account with a financial institution registered in the European Union. Both individual and corporate investors can register (companies need to provide additional documentation such as business registry extracts and representation rights).
The platform implements strict compliance measures by excluding investors from high-risk jurisdictions as defined by EU regulations. This list currently includes 28 countries across various regions, notably Iran, North Korea, Russia, Belarus, and several nations in Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean.
The platform interface is available in English and Spanish, recognizing the significant presence and high engagement of Spanish-speaking investors in the P2P lending market. This dual-language approach ensures effective communication with two of the most active investment communities in Europe.
What do we invest in ?
Individuals can invest with Finjet in Spain (Mana Concept S.L.) which is the main lending company after Ekspres Pozyczka (Argentum Capital sp. Z.o.o.) exited in March 2025. However, a new company called Firmeo (Firmeo Business Finance Sp. z o.o.) began operations in the Polish market in October 2025. They can also invest with Credilink in Romania (We Finance IFN SA).
Investors can either place their capital on short-term consumer loans, typically between 100 and 500 euros with a 30-day term, or on business loans with terms of a few months for slightly higher amounts.
For short-term opportunities, investors fund personal loan applications that have already been approved by the lending companies. Regarding business loans, investors lend their money to the loan originators which use this funding at their discretion within the scope of their activities.
Registration process
Once registered on Hive5, investors can start the identity verification process which generally takes only a few minutes. Apart from the usual selfie, investors need to take a photo of a valid and unaltered identity document on which all their personal information is clearly readable.
Then, to enable deposits/withdrawals, investors must register their bank account by transferring a minimum of 0.01 EUR to their Hive5 account. This account should be in the investor’s name and held in EUR currency within a credit institution.
Finally, Hive5 offers a loyalty program that adds between +0.5% and +1% to the proposed investment rates. To benefit from this, the investor must have been a hive5 client for more than 90 days. There are 3 loyalty levels:
- Navigator : +0.5% from 5,000 € invested
- Voyager : +0.75% from 10,000 € invested
- Pioneer : +1% from 20,000 € invested
How to invest on Hive5 ?
This P2P marketplace offers the possibility to invest either manually or by using automated strategies (there are no predefined strategies as we can see on some platforms). For the latter, a “reinvest” button offers to reinvest automatically once the loan and interest are repaid.
To set up an automated strategy, investors give a name and size to this specific portfolio, and they choose the lending companies and loan types they want to invest in. They can also specify minimum and maximum values for the amount to invest per loan, the term (in days), and the interest rate.
Although there is no secondary market, with investment durations not exceeding 3 months, this is quite a liquid market. Nevertheless, if borrowers do not repay on time, investors will have to wait 60 days until the buyback guarantee is activated (interest is also generated for the delayed period).
Is it safe to invest on Hive5 ?
Hive5 is a platform operating in established European P2P Markets while offering relatively high returns. Led by an experienced CEO, they have never experienced any payment defaults and pay investors on time. Nevertheless, Hive5 is not regulated and still lacks transparency regarding their financial data, and their statistics need clarification and improvements.
Pros to investing on Hive5
100% On time, 0% Default
One of the platform’s major strengths is maintaining a zero-default rate, whatever the lending company, since its launch in 2022. The loan originators have always respected their contractual obligations and paid the principal and interest due to investors on time each month.
Furthermore, Hive5 also has the merit of not imposing extensions on loans, making them much more liquid than other platforms. For example, Esketit can renew each investment made on its platform up to 5 times for a given loan (which some long-term investors appreciate).
Market-beating returns
To stand out, this P2P platform provides returns that exceed typical market rates (up to a maximum of 13%), which regularly positions Hive5 among the best monthly P2P returns. It should be noted, however, that in 2025, the offered returns have decreased significantly since they reached 16% at the beginning of the year.
The loan originators operating on the platform were all founded by the Hive Finance group and are therefore relatively recent (except for Ruptela). It is therefore normal that priority is given to integrating new investors by offering them attractive returns.
But given that the range of returns offered remain moderate, they have certainly been carefully evaluated before being listed. For each of their markets (Spain, Poland and Romania), Hive5 is trying to find a balance between a sustainable business model and attractive returns for investors.
Established European P2P Markets
With Spain, Poland and Romania, Hive5 is positioned in historical crowdlending markets that can be found on sevral other P2P platforms. With these three countries, investors have the guarantee of investing in markets where this activity is regulated, mature, and well organized.
Besides Spain and Poland, which are well-known, investors also have the opportunity to invest in Romania, a developing European market, in business loans whose returns are the highest and sometimes reach 13%. But these offers remain limited in time since the volumes offered are still quite low.
While investors appreciate this European foothold, they would also like to be able to diversify their portfolio on the platform. There are certain countries with strong development potential such as the Czech Republic or even Bulgaria where other platforms like Maclear are positioning themselves.
A successful Chairman
The co-founder and current Chairman of Hive Finance and the Hive5 platform is Andrius Rupšys, who is also the founder of Ruptela. This company is a provider of advanced telematics solutions and GPS tracking devices that help businesses optimize fleet management.
Andrius Rupšys founded his company in 2007, which later became Ruptela Group, an international group composed of more than 150 people with clients in over 120 countries.
Andrius took the reins of the group in February 2025 in order to move Hive Finance from a startup phase to a scale-up by bringing his experience and various expertise. For investors, this is a strong signal that strengthens the trust relationship they may have with this platform.
Cons to investing on Hive5
Hive5 is not regulated
Several other platforms, like Lonvest for example, have established their business in Croatia to take advantage of a more favorable regulatory framework and lower taxes. Thus, P2P platforms can operate at lower operational costs throughout the European Union under passporting rights.
Moreover, investors think that a regulated platform means security when this is far from the case. The best P2P platforms in our ranking are precisely those that are not regulated (the only one that is regulated, Mintos, is also the one that has more than €140M in the recovery process).
The only thing a platform must do to grow is to establish a track record of investments without defaults. This is how Hive5 can demonstrate its ability to honour its contractual commitments and thus build a lasting relationship of trust with the community of P2P investors.
Limited number of loan originators
On Hive5 website, 4 lending companies are listed, among which only one is active on a regular basis: Finjet in Spain. Ekspres Pozyczka (Poland) now successfully run their lending activities on their own funds, Credilink (Romania) issues business loans from time to time, and Ruptela activity is marginal.
Despite this, there is no cash drag to report on the platform, which continues to offer sufficient investment opportunities with a wide range of terms and high interest rates to invest in.
Hive Finance has chosen to develop its P2P lending activities through organic growth, like Robocash, making the creation and integration of new lenders a time-consuming process (Firmeo is not yet listed as a loan originator on the platform.). They aim to differentiate themselves from simple marketplaces like Mintos by using their own resources.
Financial reporting missing
In most EU jurisdictions, companies are required to submit financial statements within six months of the end of the year. However, Hive5 has not yet provided them for 2023 while investors conduct their due diligence relying on these financial documents, which should be made available much faster.
Invoquant que le partage public de leurs bilans n’est pas une pratique courante, Hive5 a choisi de publier un article sur leur blog « Principales réalisations 2024 de Hive Finance » comme solution provisoire. Mais les investisseurs estiment que cette approche contredit leur engagement de transparence.
Even though Hive Finance legal entities may not be profitable yet, this is quite normal during their early stages, and investors understand that. Sharing financial data (even if unaudited), particularly for the platform and the largest loan originator, would build trust and allow investors to monitor the financial trajectory of the business.
Surprising statistics
On several occasions, Hive5 has announced a significant influx of investors that seemed disconnected from usual standards and well above other platforms (+3,664 in December 2024, +3,838 in January 2025, and +2,759 in February 2025), which raises questions about their accuracy.
At the same time, funded volumes on the platform have not increased, yet there is no cash drag to report. By comparison, Hive5 now matches Swaper in number of investors, despite the latter is offering four times more loans and still experiencing some cash drag from time to time.
The platform does not provide a real explanation for these very strong increases in investor numbers, the evolution of which is not published regularly (only via posts). Besides, since the statistics page has now disappeared, investors can no longer track the evolution of this data.
Opinion on Hive5
Founded in 2022, Hive5 is a Croatia-based P2P platform offering investment opportunities in both business loans and short-term personal loans. Returns are among the highest on the market, often surpassing other dynamic P2P platforms such as Debitum Investments for example.
All investments listed on Hive5 come with a 60-day buyback guarantee, regardless of the loan originator offering them. Furthermore, no extensions are applied meaning that investors have a clear time horizon on their investments, and consequently, and benefit from a good level of liquidity.
The platform has never encountered any payment default from the lending companies, and payments are made on time. Withdrawals to investors’ bank accounts are processed diligently and arrive quite fast, supported by an efficient customer service team able to respond by email or on social media.
Hive5 and the listed lending companies are all part of the Hive Finance holding, which is still young and whose experience in P2P lending is yet to be demonstrated. Nevertheless, it’s worth noting the expertise of the founders both in business creation and development, and in the field of finance.
Their strategy has led them to develop in well-known and mature geographical markets for crowdlending, but offering only two countries limits diversification. While the withdrawal from the Polish market has been beneficial for the loan originator concerned, investors are feeling the effects.
This rather limited diversity underscores the need for greater transparency regarding the financial situation of the holding and its subsidiaries. It is imperative that Hive Finance publish audited financial statements at both group and company levels to enable investors to properly assess the platform’s financial health.
Transparency also applies to the unusual growth of the number of investors, which deserves a clear explanation and should be regularly posted on the website. Besides, it is quite surprising that the home page of a P2P platform does not offer a direct access to the statistics page.
Given that their unregulated environment, Hive5 needs to gain trust among the community of investors. This will be achieved by including the investors in their entrepreneurial adventure and by communicating about their strengths obviously, but also about their areas for improvement.
To conclude, Hive5 is undeniably a promising P2P platform, but as seen, progress needs to be made in terms of diversification and transparency. By addressing these two major aspects, they will be able to consolidate their ecosystem, reach economic sustainability, and unlock their full potential.
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About the Author
Silvère is an economist and IT engineer with numerous years of experience in business management, FinTech investment and digital marketing. He invests mainly in crowdlending especially P2P lending, P2B lending, and real estate crowdfunding.
Article sources
1. Article about Hive5 co-founders
2. Video on Hive finance co-founders
3. The co-founders of Hive finance group
4. Ricardas Vandzinskas, FIMA Group CFO
5. Aurimas Kacinskas joins as CEO
6. Aleksejus Tonkich, new Group’s CFO
7. UAB Hive finance Lursoft company registry
8. Hive finance, UAB revenue and profit
9. Hive finance story, how it all began
10. Hive5 About us page
11. Inga Zubanove, Head of Operations
12. Hive5 Statistics
13. Hive5 Loan originators statistics
14. Two Leaders in Russian Debt Collection
15. Meet the Team Behind Spain’s Loan Originator
16. Hive5 Loyalty program