Following its Communication in March this year entitled "Unleashing the potential of Crowdfunding in the European Union", the European Commission has issued a call for applications with a view to selecting members of an Informal Expert Group on crowdfunding, the European Crowdfunding Stakeholder Forum (ECSF) as an expert group of high level representatives of associations of concerned stakeholder groups and national authorities.
Crowdfunding is an emerging alternative source of financing that involves open calls to the public, predominantly through the internet, to raise finance for projects either through donations, monetary contributions in exchange for rewards, product pre-ordering, lending, or equity investment. This source of funding could be availed of by any type of businesses including SMEs, artists, innovative start-ups, and social entrepreneurs.
The Commission's objective is to identify the opportunities and risks of this form of finance, and to undertake a detailed analysis of the national legal frameworks applicable to it, in order to identify the best strategy for European policy to adopt. Further information is available at on the Europa.eu site
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