Digital lending e peer-to-peer lending: uno studio delle motivazioni e delle attese dei prenditori di fondi nel comparto business

Crowdfunding – also in the form of Peer-to-Peer lending (P2P) – represents an innovative form of financing the economy, both in the segment of consumers (with personal loans and mortgages) and in the segment of business activities. Some distinctive elements compared to traditional funding channels are common to all forms of P2P lending: - financing takes place on the direct market by a plurality of investors who adhere to the proposal formulated through the platform that performs a simple mediation function, to which it sometimes adds a rating function through the attribution of a rating and sometimes a pricing function or an auction mechanism; - the evaluation processes use AI technology and the relationship is mainly on line; - on platforms - although with different formats and emphasis - it is emphasised the activity/project to be financed and to the figure of the entrepreneur/management who lead the company. In the literature there is little knowledge on the underlying motivations for the use of this form of financing, on the degree of satisfaction and the critical issues faced, the subjective perception of the creditworthiness assessment procedures and the suggestions for an offer better suited to needs. Our paper is aimed at filling this gap. In order to acquire knowledge on the elements mentioned above, a survey was carried out aimed at companies that have resorted to peer-to-peer lending and a questionnaire was submitted to them. Paragraph 2 presents the survey aims and methodology, and paragraph 3 explains and comments on the results. Finally, paragraph 4 makes a few concluding remarks.