IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ces/ceswps/_8100.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Marketplace Lending of SMEs

Author

Listed:
  • Douglas J. Cumming
  • Lars Hornuf

Abstract

Peer-to-business lending refers to online platforms facilitating loans from individuals to smalland medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). We conjecture that easy-to-understand risk ratings conveyed by the platform play a pronounced role in influencing the borrowing success of SMEs and that more sophisticated financial information and adverse selection are largely absent in these markets. We introduce a dataset of 414 SME marketplace loans and 8,236 online loan days to test these propositions. The data examined provide strong support for the importance of simple platform ratings in influencing investor behavior, while the effect of more detailed financial information is less pronounced.

Suggested Citation

  • Douglas J. Cumming & Lars Hornuf, 2020. "Marketplace Lending of SMEs," CESifo Working Paper Series 8100, CESifo.
    • Handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_8100
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cesifo.org/DocDL/cesifo1_wp8100.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Herzenstein, Michal & Dholakia, Utpal M. & Andrews, Rick L., 2011. "Strategic Herding Behavior in Peer-to-Peer Loan Auctions," Journal of Interactive Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 27-36.
    2. David de Meza & David C. Webb, 1987. "Too Much Investment: A Problem of Asymmetric Information," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 102(2), pages 281-292.
    3. Asongu, Simplice A. & Nwachukwu, Jacinta C., 2016. "The role of governance in mobile phones for inclusive human development in Sub-Saharan Africa," Technovation, Elsevier, vol. 55, pages 1-13.
    4. Myers, Stewart C. & Majluf, Nicholas S., 1984. "Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 13(2), pages 187-221, June.
    5. Stewart C. Myers & Nicholas S. Majluf, 1984. "Corporate Financing and Investment Decisions When Firms Have InformationThat Investors Do Not Have," NBER Working Papers 1396, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Rajkamal Iyer & Asim Ijaz Khwaja & Erzo F. P. Luttmer & Kelly Shue, 2016. "Screening Peers Softly: Inferring the Quality of Small Borrowers," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 62(6), pages 1554-1577, June.
    7. Annamaria Lusardi & Olivia S. Mitchell, 2008. "Planning and Financial Literacy: How Do Women Fare?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(2), pages 413-417, May.
    8. Barasinska Nataliya & Schäfer Dorothea, 2014. "Is Crowdfunding Different? Evidence on the Relation between Gender and Funding Success from a German Peer-to-Peer Lending Platform," German Economic Review, De Gruyter, vol. 15(4), pages 436-452, December.
    9. Giancarlo Giudici & Massimiliano Guerini & Cristina Rossi-Lamastra, 2018. "Reward-based crowdfunding of entrepreneurial projects: the effect of local altruism and localized social capital on proponents’ success," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 50(2), pages 307-324, February.
    10. Cook, Douglas O. & Kieschnick, Robert & McCullough, B.D., 2008. "Regression analysis of proportions in finance with self selection," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 15(5), pages 860-867, December.
    11. Andy Cosh & Douglas Cumming & Alan Hughes, 2009. "Outside Enterpreneurial Capital," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 119(540), pages 1494-1533, October.
    12. Massimo G. Colombo & Chiara Franzoni & Cristina Rossi–Lamastra, 2015. "Internal Social Capital and the Attraction of Early Contributions in Crowdfunding," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 39(1), pages 75-100, January.
    13. Hornuf, Lars & Schwienbacher, Armin, 2018. "Market mechanisms and funding dynamics in equity crowdfunding," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 556-574.
    14. Cole, Rebel & Sokolyk, Tatyana, 2016. "Who needs credit and who gets credit? Evidence from the surveys of small business finances," Journal of Financial Stability, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 40-60.
    15. Simplice Asongu & Jacinta C. Nwachukwu, 2016. "Mobile Phones in the Diffusion of Knowledge and Persistence in Inclusive Human Development in Sub-Saharan Africa," Working Papers of the African Governance and Development Institute. 16/009, African Governance and Development Institute..
    16. Leland, Hayne E & Pyle, David H, 1977. "Informational Asymmetries, Financial Structure, and Financial Intermediation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 32(2), pages 371-387, May.
    17. van Rooij, Maarten & Lusardi, Annamaria & Alessie, Rob, 2011. "Financial literacy and stock market participation," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 101(2), pages 449-472, August.
    18. Lusardi, Annamaria & Mitchell, Olivia S., 2007. "Baby Boomer retirement security: The roles of planning, financial literacy, and housing wealth," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(1), pages 205-224, January.
    19. Ethan Mollick & Ramana Nanda, 2016. "Wisdom or Madness? Comparing Crowds with Expert Evaluation in Funding the Arts," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 62(6), pages 1533-1553, June.
    20. Jörn Block & Lars Hornuf & Alexandra Moritz, 2018. "Which updates during an equity crowdfunding campaign increase crowd participation?," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 50(1), pages 3-27, January.
    21. Zaiyan Wei & Mingfeng Lin, 2017. "Market Mechanisms in Online Peer-to-Peer Lending," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 63(12), pages 4236-4257, December.
    22. Colombo, Massimo G. & Piva, Evila, 2012. "Firms’ genetic characteristics and competence-enlarging strategies: A comparison between academic and non-academic high-tech start-ups," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 41(1), pages 79-92.
    23. Berger, Allen N & Udell, Gregory F, 1995. "Relationship Lending and Lines of Credit in Small Firm Finance," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 68(3), pages 351-381, July.
    24. Bertoni, Fabio & Colombo, Massimo G. & Grilli, Luca, 2011. "Venture capital financing and the growth of high-tech start-ups: Disentangling treatment from selection effects," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 40(7), pages 1028-1043, September.
    25. Douglas Cumming, 2006. "Adverse Selection and Capital Structure: Evidence from Venture Capital," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 30(2), pages 155-183, March.
    26. Amir Sufi, 2007. "Information Asymmetry and Financing Arrangements: Evidence from Syndicated Loans," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 62(2), pages 629-668, April.
    27. Stiglitz, Joseph E & Weiss, Andrew, 1981. "Credit Rationing in Markets with Imperfect Information," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 71(3), pages 393-410, June.
    28. Cho, Yoon Je, 1986. "Inefficiencies from Financial Liberalization in the Absence of Well-Functioning Equity Markets," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 18(2), pages 191-199, May.
    29. Gerrit K.C. Ahlers & Douglas Cumming & Christina Günther & Denis Schweizer, 2015. "Signaling in Equity Crowdfunding," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 39(4), pages 955-980, July.
    30. Dorfleitner, Gregor & Priberny, Christopher & Schuster, Stephanie & Stoiber, Johannes & Weber, Martina & de Castro, Ivan & Kammler, Julia, 2016. "Description-text related soft information in peer-to-peer lending – Evidence from two leading European platforms," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 169-187.
    31. Grilli, Luca & Murtinu, Samuele, 2014. "Government, venture capital and the growth of European high-tech entrepreneurial firms," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 43(9), pages 1523-1543.
    32. James B. ANG, 2014. "Innovation and Financial Liberalization: The Case of India," Economic Growth Centre Working Paper Series 1404, Nanyang Technological University, School of Social Sciences, Economic Growth Centre.
    33. Hellmuth Milde & John G. Riley, 1988. "Signaling in Credit Markets," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 103(1), pages 101-129.
    34. Lee, Neil & Sameen, Hiba & Cowling, Marc, 2015. "Access to finance for innovative SMEs since the financial crisis," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(2), pages 370-380.
    35. Cumming, Douglas & Meoli, Michele & Vismara, Silvio, 2019. "Investors’ choices between cash and voting rights: Evidence from dual-class equity crowdfunding," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 48(8), pages 1-1.
    36. Paul Belleflamme & Thomas Lambert & Armin Schwienbacher, 2013. "Individual crowdfunding practices," Venture Capital, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 15(4), pages 313-333, October.
    37. Lars Hornuf & Matthias Neuenkirch, 2017. "Pricing shares in equity crowdfunding," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 48(4), pages 795-811, April.
    38. Grinblatt, Mark & Keloharju, Matti, 2000. "The investment behavior and performance of various investor types: a study of Finland's unique data set," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(1), pages 43-67, January.
    39. Mingfeng Lin & Nagpurnanand R. Prabhala & Siva Viswanathan, 2013. "Judging Borrowers by the Company They Keep: Friendship Networks and Information Asymmetry in Online Peer-to-Peer Lending," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 59(1), pages 17-35, August.
    40. Brad M. Barber & Terrance Odean, 2008. "All That Glitters: The Effect of Attention and News on the Buying Behavior of Individual and Institutional Investors," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 21(2), pages 785-818, April.
    41. Wette, Hildegard C, 1983. "Collateral in Credit Rationing in Markets with Imperfect Information: Note," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 73(3), pages 442-445, June.
    42. Ang, James B., 2014. "Innovation and financial liberalization," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 214-229.
    43. Sila, Vathunyoo & Gonzalez, Angelica & Hagendorff, Jens, 2016. "Women on board: Does boardroom gender diversity affect firm risk?," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 36(C), pages 26-53.
    44. Steven Drucker & Manju Puri, 2009. "On Loan Sales, Loan Contracting, and Lending Relationships," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(7), pages 2635-2672, July.
    45. Silvio Vismara, 2016. "Equity retention and social network theory in equity crowdfunding," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 46(4), pages 579-590, April.
    46. Chris Yung, 2009. "Entrepreneurial Financing and Costly Due Diligence," The Financial Review, Eastern Finance Association, vol. 44(1), pages 137-149, February.
    47. Devin G. Pope & Justin R. Sydnor, 2011. "What’s in a Picture?: Evidence of Discrimination from Prosper.com," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 46(1), pages 53-92.
    48. Petersen, Mitchell A & Rajan, Raghuram G, 1994. "The Benefits of Lending Relationships: Evidence from Small Business Data," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 49(1), pages 3-37, March.
    49. Michael Spence, 1973. "Job Market Signaling," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 87(3), pages 355-374.
    50. Sondra G. Beverly & Marianne A. Hilgert & Jeanne M. Hogarth, 2003. "Household financial management: the connection between knowledge and behavior," Federal Reserve Bulletin, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.), issue Jul, pages 309-322.
    51. Jefferson Duarte & Stephan Siegel & Lance Young, 2012. "Trust and Credit: The Role of Appearance in Peer-to-peer Lending," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 25(8), pages 2455-2484.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Christian Haddad & Lars Hornuf, 2021. "The Impact of Fintech Startups on Financial Institutions' Performance and Default Risk," CESifo Working Paper Series 9050, CESifo.
    2. Bastien Lextrait, 2021. "Scaling up SME's credit scoring scope with LightGBM," EconomiX Working Papers 2021-25, University of Paris Nanterre, EconomiX.
    3. Bollaert, Helen & Lopez-de-Silanes, Florencio & Schwienbacher, Armin, 2021. "Fintech and access to finance," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    4. Chen, Xiao & Huang, Bihong & Shaban, Mohamed, 2022. "Naïve or sophisticated? Information disclosure and investment decisions in peer to peer lending," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 77(C).
    5. Samuel Ribeiro-Navarrete & Juan Piñeiro-Chousa & M. Ángeles López-Cabarcos & Daniel Palacios-Marqués, 2022. "Crowdlending: mapping the core literature and research frontiers," Review of Managerial Science, Springer, vol. 16(8), pages 2381-2411, November.
    6. Caglayan, Mustafa & Pham, Tho & Talavera, Oleksandr & Xiong, Xiong, 2020. "Asset mispricing in peer-to-peer loan secondary markets," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    7. Carlos Sanchis-Pedregosa & Emma Berenguer & Gema Albort-Morant & Jorge Anton Sanz, 2020. "Guaranteed Crowdlending Loans: A Tool for Entrepreneurial Finance Ecosystem Sustainability," The AMFITEATRU ECONOMIC journal, Academy of Economic Studies - Bucharest, Romania, vol. 22(55), pages 775-775, August.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Douglas Cumming & Lars Hornuf & Moein Karami & Denis Schweizer, 2023. "Disentangling Crowdfunding from Fraudfunding," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 182(4), pages 1103-1128, February.
    2. Daniel Blaseg & Douglas Cumming & Michael Koetter, 2021. "Equity Crowdfunding: High-Quality or Low-Quality Entrepreneurs?," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 45(3), pages 505-530, May.
    3. Samuel Ribeiro-Navarrete & Juan Piñeiro-Chousa & M. Ángeles López-Cabarcos & Daniel Palacios-Marqués, 2022. "Crowdlending: mapping the core literature and research frontiers," Review of Managerial Science, Springer, vol. 16(8), pages 2381-2411, November.
    4. Saul Estrin & Susanna Khavul & Mike Wright, 2022. "Soft and hard information in equity crowdfunding: network effects in the digitalization of entrepreneurial finance," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 58(4), pages 1761-1781, April.
    5. Friedemann Polzin & Helen Toxopeus & Erik Stam, 2018. "The wisdom of the crowd in funding: information heterogeneity and social networks of crowdfunders," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 50(2), pages 251-273, February.
    6. Walthoff-Borm, Xavier & Schwienbacher, Armin & Vanacker, Tom, 2018. "Equity crowdfunding: First resort or last resort?," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 513-533.
    7. Thomas Clauss & Thomas Niemand & Sascha Kraus & Patrick Schnetzer & Alexander Brem, 2019. "Increasing Crowdfunding Success Through Social Media: The Importance Of Reach And Utilisation In Reward-Based Crowdfunding," International Journal of Innovation Management (ijim), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 24(03), pages 1-30, May.
    8. Fabrice Hervé & Armin Schwienbacher, 2018. "Crowdfunding And Innovation," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(5), pages 1514-1530, December.
    9. Andreas Hoegen & Dennis M. Steininger & Daniel Veit, 2018. "How do investors decide? An interdisciplinary review of decision-making in crowdfunding," Electronic Markets, Springer;IIM University of St. Gallen, vol. 28(3), pages 339-365, August.
    10. Goethner, Maximilian & Hornuf, Lars & Regner, Tobias, 2021. "Protecting investors in equity crowdfunding: An empirical analysis of the small investor protection act," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 162(C).
    11. Borello, Giuliana & De Crescenzo, Veronica & Pichler, Flavio, 2019. "Factors for success in European crowdinvesting," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 106(C).
    12. Farag, Hisham & Johan, Sofia, 2021. "How alternative finance informs central themes in corporate finance," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).
    13. Adam Nowak & Amanda Ross & Christopher Yencha, 2018. "Small Business Borrowing And Peer‐To‐Peer Lending: Evidence From Lending Club," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 36(2), pages 318-336, April.
    14. Serena Gallo, 2021. "Fintech platforms: Lax or careful borrowers’ screening?," Financial Innovation, Springer;Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, vol. 7(1), pages 1-33, December.
    15. Anglin, Aaron H. & Short, Jeremy C. & Drover, Will & Stevenson, Regan M. & McKenny, Aaron F. & Allison, Thomas H., 2018. "The power of positivity? The influence of positive psychological capital language on crowdfunding performance," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 470-492.
    16. Vincenzo Butticè & Silvio Vismara, 2022. "Inclusive digital finance: the industry of equity crowdfunding," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 47(4), pages 1224-1241, August.
    17. Hellmann, Thomas & Stiglitz, Joseph, 2000. "Credit and equity rationing in markets with adverse selection," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 44(2), pages 281-304, February.
    18. Maximilian Goethner & Sebastian Luettig & Tobias Regner, 2021. "Crowdinvesting in entrepreneurial projects: disentangling patterns of investor behavior," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 57(2), pages 905-926, August.
    19. Nguyen, Thang & Cox, Joe & Rich, Judy, 2019. "Invest or regret? An empirical investigation into funding dynamics during the final days of equity crowdfunding campaigns," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 784-803.
    20. Cai, Wanxiang & Polzin, Friedemann & Stam, Erik, 2021. "Crowdfunding and social capital: A systematic review using a dynamic perspective," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 162(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    debt crowdfunding; entrepreneurial finance; digital platforms;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G21 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Banks; Other Depository Institutions; Micro Finance Institutions; Mortgages
    • G24 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Investment Banking; Venture Capital; Brokerage
    • G32 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Financing Policy; Financial Risk and Risk Management; Capital and Ownership Structure; Value of Firms; Goodwill

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_8100. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Klaus Wohlrabe (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cesifde.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.