Does equity crowdfunding democratize entrepreneurial finance?

This paper investigates whether gender, age, ethnicity, and geography affect the choice of equity crowdfunding offerings vs initial public offerings (IPO) on traditional stock markets and whether these characteristics increase the likelihood of a successful offering. Using 167 equity offerings in Crowdcube and 99 equity offerings on London’s Alternative Investment Market raising between £300,000 and £5 m, we find that companies with younger top management team (TMT) members are both more likely to launch equity crowdfunding offerings than IPOs and have higher chances to successfully complete an equity crowdfunding offering. Remotely located companies are more likely to launch equity crowdfunding offerings than IPOs and have higher chances to successfully complete an equity crowdfunding offering. On the contrary, female entrepreneurs do not have higher chances to raise funds in equity crowdfunding. Minority entrepreneurs do not have higher chances of successfully raising capital but do attract a higher number of investors. Overall, our evidence provides empirical guidance for the first time to the oft-repeated policy claim that equity crowdfunding democratizes entrepreneurial finance by providing access to funding to underrepresented groups of potential entrepreneurs

The geography of initial coin offerings

Initial coin offerings (ICOs) are a rapidly growing phenomenon wherein entrepreneurial ventures raise funds for the development of blockchain-based businesses. Although they have recently sprouted up all over the world, raising millions of dollars for early-stage firms, few empirical studies are available to help understand the emergence of ICOs across countries. Based on the population of 915 ICOs issued in 187 countries between January 2017 and March 2018, our study reveals that ICOs take place more frequently in countries with developed financial systems, public equity markets, and advanced digital technologies. The availability of investment-based crowdfunding platforms is also positively associated with the emergence of ICOs, while debt and private equity markets do not provide similar effects. Countries with ICO-friendly regulations have more ICOs, whereas tax regimes are not clearly related to ICOs

Universities' attractiveness to students: The Darwinism effect

AbstractDue to significant government cuts to Higher Education funding in Southern European systems, their already underfunded universities were forced to increasingly compete for students as sources of additional revenue. Concurrently, families and students that continued to afford participation in Higher Education became more selective when choosing a university, realising the riskier investment that Higher Education participation had become. Through a competing destinations model and relying on all Italian private and public universities, this study finds that the competition forces characterising universities' attractiveness over the last decade have changed since the financial crisis of 2008. In a context of lower demand for Higher Education, the competition for students grew and universities in close proximity were better prepared to face the new challenges, leading to the growth of Higher Education clusters

Universities’ responses to crises : the influence of competition and reputation on tuition fees

Author's accepted manuscript.Available from 10/11/2021.This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version of an article published in Higher Education. The final authenticated version is available online at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10734-020-00622-2.acceptedVersio

Exit strategy or springboard for career development? The case of university executives' remuneration

The steady increase of chief executives' compensation in both public and private universities has long been at the centre of public debate and has received a lot of criticism in the UK. As higher education is considered as an industry, a pay for performance relationship is expected. This paper differs by demonstrating that UK Vice Chancellors consider incentives other than remuneration in their career progression. By constructing a comprehensive dataset of UK Vice Chancellors covering academic years 2012/2013 to 2016/2017, we demonstrate that UK university chief executives, especially if young, are willing to accept lower salaries when they interpret their role as a springboard for visible high-profile positions in the public arena

Performance of microfinance institutions in achieving the poverty outreach and financial sustainability: When age and size matter?

Using a two-stage DEA bootstrapped metafrontier approach, we investigate the effects of age and size on efficiency estimates of microfinance institutions (MFIs). In the first-stage, we use a metafrontier model combining with DEA bootstrapped procedure to obtain statistically robust and comparable efficiencies. In the second-stage, we employ a bootstrapped truncated regression to account for the impact of exogenous factors on both dimensions of efficiency. Results highlight the importance of model specification for MFIs operating in different geographical regions. Moreover, we find that although older MFIs perform better than younger ones in terms of achieving financial results, they are relatively inefficient in achieving outreach objectives. We also document that MFI size matters: larger MFIs tend to have higher financial and outreach efficiency

Using citation metrics as part of academic recruitment decisions leads to an increase in self-citations

The use of citation metrics in academic hiring and promotion decisions was intended as a response to important and legitimate concerns over the meritocracy of recruitment procedures. However, evidence suggests that doing so distorts scientists' behaviour and increases the risk that these measures become unreliable. Marco Seeber, Mattia Cattaneo, Michele Meoli and Paolo Malighetti investigated the use of citation metrics within the Italian higher education system and found that scientists responded to a new regulation linking career advancement to metric scores by increasingly citing their own work. Policymakers should take note and use bibliometric tools as a means of informing rather than determining evaluations, as advocated by initiatives such as DORA and the Leiden Manifesto

Money Market Funds, Shadow Banking and Systemic Risk in United Kingdom

Shadow banking entities have been repeatedly charged with the breaking up of the recent financial crises. This paper examines the contribution of the money market funds, an important part of the shadow banking entities, to the systemic risk in United Kingdom by using the CoVaR methodology (Adrian and Brunnermeier, 2016). Using a sample of 143 money market funds, continuously listed between 2005Q4 and 2013Q4, we investigate the impact of institutional corporate variables on the systemic risk. Our results show that liquidity mismatch increases the average systemic risk over the whole period, but decreases the risk during the Great Financial Depression

Efficiencies of Faith and Secular Microfinance Institutions in Regions of Asia, Africa, and Latin America: A Two-Stage Dual Efficiency Bootstrap DEA Approach

Purpose: the objective is to measure the financial and social performance of 127 microfinance institutions (MFIs) and observe the effects with explanatory factors such as “type”, “geography region”, and “secular and faith” variables. Design/methodology/approach: The time-series performance analysis of microfinance institutions is determined in two stages. In the first stage, both the social and financial efficiencies are measured with Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) approach. The two explanatory factors along with faith and secular variables show the effect on these determined efficiencies by the second stage of the Tobit regression Random effect Model. Findings: Financial performance is greater than the social performance from the first stage analysis. When considering the explanatory variables, the social performances are not significant with religious factors. When the regression is performed in a group, the financial score is more significant with religious and other explanatory variables. Faith-based and secular-based microfinance institutions are strongly significant if the performances (efficiencies) are highly maintained. Originality/Value: faith and secular variables are identified based on the background/history information of each microfinance institution (MFI)