What makes equity crowdfunding successful in Japan? Testing the signaling and lack of financial literacy hypotheses

PURPOSE: The first objective of this study is to identify the factors that contribute to the success of equity crowdfunding (ECF) campaigns in Japan. We examined what makes a campaign successful using data from 217 campaigns conducted on FUNDINNO, Japan’s largest ECF platform, between February 2017 and May 2021. The second objective is to assess individual investors’ financial literacy based on the ECF campaign’s success or failure. This study is unique in that it focuses on funding method differences as well as the contents of the business plans disclosed in the ECF campaigns. In Japan, a common equity campaign and stock acquisition rights campaign are run on the same ECF platform, as if they were the same type of funding. Common stock and stock acquisition rights are treated differently by venture capitalists and other professional investors. By comparing the success or failure of the two Japanese projects, we can assess individual investors’ financial literacy after taking into account the project signals. METHODOLOGY: The “Signaling Hypothesis” and the “Lack of Financial Literacy Hypothesis” were tested. Nine and four variables were set as proxy variables for the Signaling Hypothesis and the Lack of Financial Literacy Hypothesis, respectively. This study first divides the qualitative data into success/failure dichotomies for the proxy variables that comprise the hypotheses and then uses a chi-square test to examine the composition ratio of each. The quantitative data among the hypotheses’ proxy variables are then tested for differences in means (t-test) and medians (Wilcoxon signed-rank test). Subsequently, we perform a probit analysis with the explained variable being “success (1)/failure (0)” and the explanatory variable being a proxy variable for the hypothesis. We begin with a probit analysis, and the Logit model is then introduced. Finally, a multiple regression analysis is run with the explained variables “fundraising rate” and “number of investors” and the hypothesized proxy variables as explanatory variables. FINDINGS: We found that the “number of directors” is an effective management ability indicator of ECF success. In terms of start-up fundamentals, investors appear to accept the signals “intellectual property”, “product releases” and “tax incentives.” Awards affected the size of the final funding round. In contrast, B2C companies negatively signaled to private investors. The proxy variable “in final year sales” was supported concerning the lack of a financial literacy hypothesis. Individual investors can be assumed to be financially literate if they perform due diligence. However, since “expected rate of return (Internal Rate of Return, hereafter abbreviated as IRR)” and “common stock dummy” are uncorrelated, we can conclude that they do not demonstrate financial literacy in “valuation,” nor whether or not the investment is profitable. Thus, individual investors’ financial literacy in the Japanese ECF can be considered to be limited. IMPLICATIONS: We have demonstrated which signals investors in Japan’s ECF campaigns respond to. These guidelines will be useful for future start-ups planning ECF campaigns. We were able to identify the lack of financial literacy among ECF individual investors. Therefore, for Japan’s equity capital market to grow in the future, individual investors’ financial literacy must be improved. ORIGINALITY AND VALUE: With very limited analysis in Asia, home to the world’s second- and third-largest stock markets, we have identified the factors behind the success of Japan’s ECF. Identifying success factors in a country like Japan, where many individual investors are extremely risk averse, will provide new insights. By comparing the success or failure of the two types of Japanese ECF projects (common equity projects and stock acquisition rights), we could test the financial literacy of individual investors, taking into account the project signals

Impact of Workplace on the Risk of Severe COVID-19

Indiscriminate regional lockdowns aim to prevent the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) infection by restricting the movement of people; however, this comes with psychological, social, and economic costs. Measures are needed that complement lockdowns and reduce adverse effects. Epidemiological studies, to date, have identified high-risk populations, but not workplaces appropriate for closure. This study was conducted to provide evidence-based measures that used exact and reliable follow-up data of the PCR-positive COVID-19 cases to complement lockdowns. The data are not subjected to selection or follow-up biases, since the Japanese government, by law, must register and follow all the PCR-positive cases until either recovery or death. Direct customer exposure may affect the quantity of viral inoculum received, which, in turn, may affect the risk of the severity of disease at infection. Therefore, the professions of the cases were grouped according to their frequency of direct customer exposure (FDCE) based on subjective observations, which resulted in five workplaces; hospital, school, food service, outdoor service, and indoor office being identified. Analyzing the follow-up data, we obtained precise estimates for the risk of severe disease, defined as intensive care unit (ICU) hospitalization or death, for the workplaces adjusted for age, sex, family status, and comorbidity. Major findings are as follows: hospital and school are the lowest risk, food and outdoor services are, despite higher FDCE, safer than indoor office. Unemployed and unclear are the highest risk, despite low FDCE. These results suggest the following workplace-specific measures complementing the lockdown: school should not be closed and indiscriminate closing of food and outdoor service industries should be avoided, since it would be more effective to reinforce their efforts to promote adherence to public health guidelines among students and customers. These actions would also reduce the adverse effects of the lockdown. This study is the first to address the causality between the workplaces and severe disease. We introduce FDCE and adherence to public health guidelines (APHGs) to associate the workplace characteristics with the risk of COVID-19 severity, which provided the basis for the measures complementing lockdowns

Calculation of absolute free energy of binding for theophylline and its analogs to RNA aptamer using nonequilibrium work values

The massively parallel computation of absolute binding free energy with a well-equilibrated system (MP-CAFEE) has been developed [H. Fujitani, Y. Tanida, M. Ito, G. Jayachandran, C. D. Snow, M. R. Shirts, E. J. Sorin, and V. S. Pande, J. Chem. Phys. ${\bf 123}$, 084108 (2005)]. As an application, we perform the binding affinity calculations of six theophylline-related ligands with RNA aptamer. Basically, our method is applicable when using many compute nodes to accelerate simulations, thus a parallel computing system is also developed. To further reduce the computational cost, the adequate non-uniform intervals of coupling constant $\lambda$, connecting two equilibrium states, namely bound and unbound, are determined. The absolute binding energies $\Delta G$ thus obtained have effective linear relation between the computed and experimental values. If the results of two other different methods are compared, thermodynamic integration (TI) and molecular mechanics Poisson-Boltzmann surface area (MM-PBSA) by the paper of Gouda $et al$ [H. Gouda, I. D. Kuntz, D. A. Case, and P. A. Kollman, Biopolymers ${\bf 68}$, 16 (2003)], the predictive accuracy of the relative values $\Delta\Delta G$ is almost comparable to that of TI: the correlation coefficients (R) obtained are 0.99 (this work), 0.97 (TI), and 0.78 (MM-PBSA). On absolute binding energies meanwhile, a constant energy shift of $\sim$ -7 kcal/mol against the experimental values is evident. To solve this problem, several presumable reasons are investigated.Comment: 23 pages including 6 figure

Bathymetry Mapping at Kuroshima Knoll with Synthenic Aperture of Interferometry Sonar

特集1 海中工学研究センタ

Exploration of NW Rota 1 Underwater Volcano by Autonomous Underwater Vehicle "r2D4"

特集1 海中工学研究センタ

Wind-up AUVs: combined energy storage and attitude control using control moment gyros

This research develops a system to combine energy storage and attitude control functions in control moment gyros (CMGs) for application onboard autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs). This is proposed as part of a hybrid energy storage system to allow AUVs to perform their missions with no chemical batteries at all. In previous works, the authors developed an attitude control scheme based on the gyroscopic torques developed by a cluster of four CMGs, which was implemented onboard the test-bed AUV 'IKURA', and successfully demonstrated full three-dimensional attitude control capabilities. This paper extends the control scheme to overcome interactions between the kinetic energy and angular momentum stored in the CMG flywheels, to allow the energy mechanically stored in the rotation of the flywheels to power the electronics of the robot, while simultaneously controlling its three-dimensional attitude. The control scheme is implemented on a four unit CMG pyramid developed for IKURA and series of land experiments are performed to demonstrate simultaneous energy transfer and attitude control.</p