Five things to remember after ten years in business (2/5)
In this article, we look back at the regulatory changes that have profoundly altered participative financing over the past 10 years.
EasyCrowd officially celebrated its 10th anniversary a few months ago. Since the end of 2013, we have supported dozens of teams in the technical and strategic implementation of their online funding platform.
It would be an understatement to say that the crowdfunding sector has evolved somewhat in ten years. After discussing this with Ludovic, we thought it would be appropriate to share with you the five most significant changes of the last ten years.
For this first part, we wanted to look at the economic context.
When we launched EasyCrowd at the end of 2013, the financial crisis was still on everyone's mind. Low interest rates allowed companies to finance themselves at low cost. This situation persisted throughout the 2010s. At the same time, financing via online platforms was booming. Small and medium-sized associations were discovering relatively affordable tools for collecting and mobilizing funds, property developers were finding ways to refinance their equity capital, and some companies were reaching out to a wider circle of investors. Only corporate debt financing (loans and bonds) seemed tricky to implement, due to the model's direct competition with traditional lending institutions (banks).
This context lasted long enough to become, after a few years, the norm. Certainly, some donation platforms ceased to operate, and investment players were forced to turn to developer financing when tax benefits relating to corporate equity financing were restricted, but the sector as a whole experienced significant growth due to the favourable economic context (we'll return to the regulatory context in a forthcoming publication).
In 2022, everything is changing: liquidity is becoming more expensive, and rising labor and raw material costs are directly affecting the profitability of many structures. Some crowdfunding platforms are shutting down due to a lack of profitability in their business model, while others are seeing more and more projects accumulate payment delays and defaults, particularly in the real estate sector.
Despite this, companies with solid business models - which are not necessarily the most profitable in the short term - remain well positioned to emerge stronger from this economic turmoil.
Photo by Markus Spiske via Unsplash
In this article, we look back at the regulatory changes that have profoundly altered participative financing over the past 10 years.
Find out which applications EasyCrowd communicates with natively!
Why transparency is one of our core values