In perhaps the biggest signal yet that crowdfunding is becoming an incredibly viable investment play, Indiegogo CEO, Slava Rubin (above), recently suggested to CNBC that his service may enter the equity crowd funding markets in future:
“I think there is a massive market to be had if equity crowdfunding ever happens,” he said. “We are super bullish, but we have to wait and see what the regulations will be.”
Such plans would be a big step for Indiegogo. The service is already among the top three reward-based crowd funding sites. Any move to enter the equity investments space pits it against the likes of Angels Den or CrowdCube. Meanwhile, KickStarter has categorically said it has no interest in equity funding.
This seems set to change, of course, as financial regulators worldwide recognise the need to loosen up their rules to enable a wider church of individuals to make investments in innovative firms. After all, why should the potential benefits of such investments be limited to “high net worth” individuals?
“It’s a tricky balancing act, you need to look for investor protections and also make sure you allow for innovation,” Rubin said.
“What’s really interesting is that why everybody is talking about equity crowdfunding, Indiegogo has grown over 1,000 percent since the JOBS Act was signed, because there is massive demand for funding without equity,” he said.
Indiegogo plainly hopes to capitalise on any such market deregulation. “It’s a really exciting industry, the 80′s was all about desktop computing, the 90′s was all about online commerce, and the early 2000′s was all about social networking,” Rubin said. “And this decade will go down as the decade of funding by the time it’s over.”
