Equity crowdfunding platforms: a demographic and operational performance analysis of the Italian scenario

Purpose. The paper aims to investigate Italian equity crowdfunding platforms and their role in supporting innovative SMEs. Nowadays, platforms represent one of the many facets of innovative and digital entrepreneurial phenomena that support the development of SMEs through innovative financial tools.Design/methodology/approach. The exploratory descriptive qualitative (EDQ) research method supports the paper, analysing the 51 Italian equity crowdfunding platforms authorized by CONSOB (Italian acronym of “Commissione Nazionale per le Società e la Borsa”). Dataset analysis has been built through ordinary records contained within CONSOB register and with financial and non-financial data from AIDA database.Findings. The research highlights an irregular platforms’ distribution with a concentration in northern Italy (RQ1). Focusing on performance (RQ2), only a residual part of the platforms show positive results (35% of the sample).Only a few players run the equity crowdfunding market and SMEs seem to prefer only certain platforms for promoting their campaigns.Practical and Social implications. The present research can be useful in twofold. On one hand, it can help public authorities, such as CONSOB. with monitoring the equity crowdfunding phenomenon. On the other hand, it can guide practitioners in supporting innovative small businesses toward platforms that perform better and therefore, help them to stand a better chance of success in raising capital.Originality of the study. The present paper enriches the literature on innovative small-medium enterprises and innovative financial tools. Several aspects of the workings of the innovative equity financial market for SMEs have been treated, and several topics theorized by scholars on equity crowdfunding platforms have been checked within this empirical study.