To celebrate its second birthday, Crowdcube has published a new infographic with the statistics behind its success to date. Since it launched in February 2011, Crowdcube, the world’s first equity crowdfunding platform, has raised £5,333,000 for 39 UK businesses, of which 97% are eligible for income tax breaks for investors. These companies will create and safeguard an estimated 918 jobs over the next three years.
Infographic: The stats behind Crowdcube’s success so far
Tax reliefs – up to 50 per cent – for investors from Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS) and Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme (SEIS) are proving to be a crucial ingredient for businesses seeking finance. The largest single investment through Crowdcube is £100,000 with the average much lower at £2,547. Food & drink and internet-based businesses continue to be popular sectors to invest in.
Darren Westlake, CEO and co-founder of Crowdcube commented: “The UK has some of the best tax incentives in the world to stimulate equity investment into start-up and early stage businesses. Investors are savvy about these tax breaks and it is clearly an important factor when deciding where to invest.”
Over £3 million has been successfully raised via Crowdcube over the last twelve months alone, with notable success stories including: Escape the City, which turned down two offers from well-known global Venture Capital firms and raised £600,000 on Crowdcube in just two weeks, and Financial Fairy Tales, which raised £20,000 from 22 investors in seven days. Most recently, Righteous raised £150,000 from 84 investors in its second round of funding.
Twenty-two per cent of people who have invested through Crowdcube have done so in multiple businesses, creating a portfolio, with the biggest portfolio including 22 different investments.
Westlake continued: “We’re delighted to see so many investors spreading their risk by diversifying their investment in multiple businesses. This is an important strategy to manage the high risk of investing and we expect to see more of this behaviour in 2013.”
Authorised and regulated by the Financial Services Authority (FSA), Crowdcube now has over 30,000 investors registered on the site.