Minibonds: a European perspective

This chapter focuses on European firms, particularly small and medium ones, and on their quest to obtain new financing alternatives, especially in view of the bank lending restrictions occurred over the last years, which have been emphasized by the several crises the world economies have experienced (financial, pandemic, and geopolitical crisis). Underlining the most important changes in the banks-firms relationship, therefore, this chapter highlights the need of the diversification of the financing sources for firms in general and small and medium enterprise (SMEs) in particular. The issue of bonds (minibonds), which are well-suited to the peculiarities of SMEs, seems to be one of the possible answers to this question. Under the Capital markets Union and similar European measures, the hope is that each European country is willing to promote the diversification of the funding alternatives for SMEs, with the crucial aim of enhancing their competitiveness. In this respect we analyze some examples of creation of dedicated markets for the issue of minibonds within Europe.