Financing
Funding is the act of providing resources to finance a need, program, or project. While this is usually in the form of money, it can also take the form of effort or time from an organization or company. Generally, this word is used when a firm uses its internal reserves to satisfy its necessity for cash, while the term financing is used when the firm acquires capital from external sources. Sources of funding include credit, venture capital, donations, grants, savings, subsidies, and taxes. Funding methods such as donations, subsidies, and grants that have no direct requirement for return of investment are described as "soft funding" or "crowdfunding". Funding that facilitates the exchange of equity ownership in a company for capital investment via an online funding portal per the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act (alternately, the "JOBS Act of 2012") (U.S.) is known as equity crowdfunding. Funds can be allocated for either short-term or long-term purposes. Economics In ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Venture Capital
Venture capital (VC) is a form of private equity financing provided by firms or funds to start-up company, startup, early-stage, and emerging companies, that have been deemed to have high growth potential or that have demonstrated high growth in terms of number of employees, annual revenue, scale of operations, etc. Venture capital firms or funds invest in these early-stage companies in exchange for Equity (finance), equity, or an ownership stake. Venture capitalists take on the risk of financing start-ups in the hopes that some of the companies they support will become successful. Because Startup company, startups face high uncertainty, VC investments have high rates of failure. Start-ups are usually based on an innovation, innovative technology or business model and often come from high technology industries such as information technology (IT) or biotechnology. Pre-seed and seed money, seed rounds are the initial stages of funding for a startup company, typically occurring earl ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Equity Crowdfunding
Equity crowdfunding is the online offering of private company securities to a group of people for investment and therefore it is a part of the capital markets. Because equity crowdfunding involves investment into a commercial enterprise, it is often subject to securities and financial regulation. Equity crowdfunding is also referred to as crowdinvesting, investment crowdfunding, or crowd equity. Equity crowdfunding is a mechanism that enables broad groups of investors to fund startup companies and small businesses in return for equity. Investors give money to a business and receive ownership of a small piece of that business. If the business succeeds, then its value goes up, as well as the value of a share in that business—the converse is also true. Coverage of equity crowdfunding indicates that its potential is greatest with startup businesses that are seeking smaller investments to achieve establishment, while follow-on funding (required for subsequent growth) may come fr ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Crowdfunding
Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising money from a large number of people, typically via the internet. Crowdfunding is a form of crowdsourcing and Alternative Finance, alternative finance, to fund projects "without standard financial intermediaries". Mollick, E. (2014). ''The dynamics of crowdfunding: An exploratory study.'' Journal of Business Venturing. Vol. 29, pp. 1–16. In 2015, over was raised worldwide by crowdfunding. Although similar concepts can also be executed through mail-order subscriptions, benefit events, and other methods, the term crowdfunding refers to internet-mediated registries. This modern crowdfunding model is generally based on three types of actors – the project initiator who proposes the idea or project to be funded, individuals or groups who support the idea, and a moderating organization (the "platform") that brings the parties together to launch the idea. The term crowdfunding was coined in 2006 by entrepreneur an ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Entrepreneurs
Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value in ways that generally entail beyond the minimal amount of risk (assumed by a traditional business), and potentially involving values besides simply economic ones. An entrepreneur () is an individual who creates and/or invests in one or more businesses, bearing most of the risks and enjoying most of the rewards. The process of setting up a business is known as "entrepreneurship". The entrepreneur is commonly seen as an innovator, a source of new ideas, goods, services, and business/or procedures. More narrow definitions have described entrepreneurship as the process of designing, launching and running a new business, often similar to a small business, or (per ''Business Dictionary'') as the "capacity and willingness to develop, organize and manage a business venture along with any of its risks to make a profit". The people who create these businesses are often referred to as "entrepreneurs". In the field of ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Debt Financing
Debt is an obligation that requires one party, the debtor, to pay money borrowed or otherwise withheld from another party, the creditor. Debt may be owed by a sovereign state or country, local government, company, or an individual. Commercial debt is generally subject to contractual terms regarding the amount and timing of repayments of principal and interest. Loans, bonds, notes, and mortgages are all types of debt. In financial accounting, debt is a type of financial transaction, as distinct from equity. The term can also be used metaphorically to cover moral obligations and other interactions not based on a monetary value. For example, in Western cultures, a person who has been helped by a second person is sometimes said to owe a "debt of gratitude" to the second person. Etymology The English term "debt" was first used in the late 13th century and comes by way of Old French from the Latin verb ''debere'', "to owe; to have from someone else." The related term "debt ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Angel Investor
An angel investor (also known as a business angel, informal investor, angel funder, private investor, or seed investor) is an individual who provides capital to a business or businesses, including startups, usually in exchange for convertible debt or ownership equity. Angel investors often provide support to startups at a very early stage (when the risk of their failure is relatively high), once or in a consecutive manner, and when most investors are not prepared to back them. In a survey of 150 founders conducted by Wilbur Labs, about 70% of entrepreneurs will face potential business failure, and nearly 66% will face this potential failure within 25 months of launching their company. A small but increasing number of angel investors invest online through equity crowdfunding or organize themselves into angel groups or angel networks to share investment capital and provide advice to their portfolio companies. The number of angel investors has greatly increased since the mid-20th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Indirect Finance
Indirect finance is where borrowers borrow funds from the financial market through indirect means, such as through a financial intermediary. This is different from direct financing where there is a direct connection to the financial markets as indicated by the borrower issuing securities directly on the market. Common methods for indirect financing include a financial auction (where price of the security is bid upon) or an initial public offering (where the security is sold for a set initial price). By allowing borrowers to obtain financing through a third party, indirect financing can improve risk management and liquidity. Indirect financing (government) This is where the government gives privilege, in the form of reduced tax burdens, as a means of supporting a particular interest rather than collecting and redistributing tax revenue (which would be considered as a direct financing method by the government). For example, a reduced tax burden on financiers provides focused ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Direct Finance
Direct finance is a method of financing where borrowers borrow funds directly from the financial market without using a third party service, such as a financial intermediary. This is different from indirect financing where a financial intermediary takes the money from the lender with an interest rate and lends it to a borrower with a higher interest rate. Direct financing is usually done by borrowers that sell securities and/or shares to raise money and circumvent the high interest rate of financial intermediary (banks). We may regard transactions as direct finance, even when a financial intermediary is included, in case no asset transformation has taken place. An example is a household which buys a newly issued government bond through the services of a broker, when the bond is sold by the broker in its original state. Another good example for direct finance is a business which directly buys newly issued commercial papers from another business entity. Direct finance is a cornersto ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Financial Market
A financial market is a market in which people trade financial securities and derivatives at low transaction costs. Some of the securities include stocks and bonds, raw materials and precious metals, which are known in the financial markets as commodities. The term "market" is sometimes used for what are more strictly ''exchanges'', that is, organizations that facilitate the trade in financial securities, e.g., a stock exchange or commodity exchange. This may be a physical location (such as the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), London Stock Exchange (LSE), Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) or Johannesburg Stock Exchange ( JSE Limited)) or an electronic system such as NASDAQ. Much trading of stocks takes place on an exchange; still, corporate actions (mergers, spinoffs) are outside an exchange, while any two companies or people, for whatever reason, may agree to sell the stock from the one to the other without using an exchange. Trading of currencies and bonds is largely on a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Money
Money is any item or verifiable record that is generally accepted as payment for goods and services and repayment of debts, such as taxes, in a particular country or socio-economic context. The primary functions which distinguish money are: medium of exchange, a unit of account, a store of value and sometimes, a standard of deferred payment. Money was historically an emergent market phenomenon that possessed intrinsic value as a commodity; nearly all contemporary money systems are based on unbacked fiat money without use value. Its value is consequently derived by social convention, having been declared by a government or regulatory entity to be legal tender; that is, it must be accepted as a form of payment within the boundaries of the country, for "all debts, public and private", in the case of the United States dollar. The money supply of a country comprises all currency in circulation (banknotes and coins currently issued) and, depending on the particular definiti ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Financial Intermediary
A financial intermediary is an institution or individual that serves as a " middleman" among diverse parties in order to facilitate financial transactions. Common types include commercial banks, investment banks, stockbrokers, insurance and pension funds, pooled investment funds, leasing companies, and stock exchanges. The financial intermediary thus facilitates the indirect channeling of funds between, generically, lenders and borrowers. That is, savers (lenders) give funds to an intermediary institution (such as a bank), and that institution gives those funds to spenders (borrowers). When the money is lent directly - via the financial markets - eliminating the financial intermediary, this is known as financial disintermediation. Economic function Financial intermediaries, as outlined, essentially, channel funds from those who have surplus capital ( savers) to those who require liquid funds to carry out a desired activity ( investors). Financial intermediaries thus '' ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |