Investing

European crowdfunding platform October has facilitated one billion euros of funding. The platform focuses on provides funding to SMEs in Europe. Together, the companies that have received funds from the platform, generate a turnover of 25 billion euros and employ more than 90,000 people.

European lending platform Bondora has increased the monthly investment limit on its auto-invest product called Go & Grow. Existing investors can now invest up to 700 euros automatically per month.

European investment platform Nibble is launching a new product: Legal Strategy. This gives private investors the opportunity to invest in debts. According to the platform, it offers a minimum guaranteed annual interest rate of 8 percent.

In 2022 over 1 billion euros was raised via crowdfunding platforms in the Netherlands. That is a 48 percent increase compared to the year before. The amount was put towards more than 18,000 projects, mostly business loans.

The French government wants to triple the amount of business angels in the country. Officials want to adopt two UK programs, the EIS and SEIS, which provide early-stage tax incentives. As a result, the government hopes that business angels will invest 3 billion euros annually into startups, creating 200,000 jobs by 2027.

Equity crowfunding platform Crowdcube and Octopus Investments are partnering up. Together, they have created a solution that lowers the minimum level of an investment into Venture Capital Trusts (VCTs) to 500 euros. This means that more retail investors will have access to investing in these companies.

In 2022, French crowdfunding platforms collected 2.35 billion euros. This is a growth of 25 percent compared to 2021. The increase was mostly caused by the increase in real estate crowdfunding, which accounted for two thirds of the total funding amount.

Saving and investment app Plum has announced an expansion into 5 European countries: Italy, Portugal, Greece, Cyprus and the Netherlands. The company is now present in 10 markets.

Dutch crowdfunding platform Oneplanetcrowd has been acquired by the Finnish Invesdor Group. As a result of the takeover, together, the companies have invested over 438 million euros in sustainable companies. Both platforms will continue operating under their own name.

Latvian peer-to-peer lending platform Mintos has reached a new milestone of 500,000 registered users. During this year, an average of 4,372 new users registered each month. The platform expects to continue growing its customer base next year.