To date, much of the research on early-stage equity investing has revolved around the question of whether early-stage equity investors place more importance on the entrepreneur (jockey) or the business opportunity (horse). Yet research has failed to agree on the relative importance of these two...

We examine how investor-level tax incentives affect financing for start-ups using the introduction of a generous tax deduction for qualified angel and VC investment in China as a quasi-natural experiment. We find that the tax incentive increases funding for eligible start-ups, with stronger...