This European Small Business Finance Outlook (ESBFO) provides an overview of the main markets relevant to EIF (equity, guarantees, securitisation, microfinance). It is an update of the ESBFO June 2016. We start by discussing the general market environment, then look at the main aspects of equity...

This EIF Working Paper investigates financing patterns of European SMEs by looking at a large number of different financing instruments and their complementary and substitutive effects, using the SAFE dataset collected in 2015. We develop an empirical taxonomy of SME financing patterns in...

This report discusses the activity of credit guarantee schemes (CGSs) in Western Europe and presents an analysis based on a novel survey, conducted by the European Investment Bank (EIB) Group1, among 18 credit guarantee organisations in 13 countries and 33 banks operating in 17 countries. The...

This European Small Business Finance Outlook (ESBFO) provides an overview of the main markets relevant to EIF (equity, guarantees, securitisation, microfinance). It is an update of the ESBFO December 2016. We start by discussing the general market environment, then look at the main aspects of...

The vast majority of firms in Europe are micro firms. Still, we know little about their financing patterns. Our paper aims to close this gap. Based on a large European firm-level data set, we find that micro firms differ in their financing patterns from small and medium-sized companies. Our...

This European Small Business Finance Outlook (ESBFO) provides an overview of the main markets relevant to EIF (equity, guarantees, securitisation, microfinance). It is an update of the June 2017 ESBFO edition. We start by discussing the general market environment, then look at the main aspects...

This EIF Working Paper outlines the methodology underlying the new EIF SME Access to Finance (ESAF) Index. This newly developed index aims at monitoring developments in SMEs' access to financial resources in the EU and is going to be periodically updated. It fills a gap as such an index does not...

This working paper presents results of the first EIF Business Angels Survey, a survey among Business Angels (BA) who benefited from the European Angels Fund (EAF), an initiative advised by the EIF and providing equity to BAs for the financing of innovative companies in the form of...

This working paper provides an overview of the main markets relevant to the EIF. It starts by discussing the general market environment, then looks at the main aspects of equity finance and the markets for SME debt products, and, finally, it highlights important aspects of microfinance in...

2020 was an unprecedented and remarkable year, and also a year with high uncertainty and increased information needs. The EIF VC Survey, the EIF Private Equity Mid-Market Survey, and the EIF Business Angels Survey (the largest regular survey exercises among GPs and Business Angels on a...