Seeds of Change: Emerging sources of non bank funding for Britain’s SMEs

New peer to peer style sources of business funding have taken root and are beginning to make available serious amounts for SME funding. Through the internet various forms of crowd funding are developing and a new report from CSFI (Centre for the Study of Financial Innovation), sponsored by the ACT and Nabarro, catalogues and explains who the new names are and what form of finance each is targeting. The report covers loan funding initiatives along with equity finance for start ups and more established businesses, alternative stock exchanges and invoice or supply chain finance, and innovative financial instruments. The directory lists 49 firms one way or another involved in these sorts of funding ideas.

The power of the internet to connect perhaps several thousand individuals lending very small amounts that cumulate to a substantial loan to one business, combined with streamlined processing and administration from providers like Funding Circle, makes all this possible. Equally exciting is the prospect that some of these concepts could be rolled out to larger companies.

The report is available at a cost of £25 from the CSFI bookstore