Research grant for project within Financial Market Regulations

The research project Financial Market Regulations, Entrepreneurship and Firm Growth has received SEK 2,4 million from Vinnova (Swedish Governmental Agency for Innovation Systems).

The purpose of the project is to empirically examine how financial regulations may affect entrepreneurship and the growth of small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs).

The project is run in collaboration between JIBS and the Swedish Entrepreneurship Forum, and coordinated by Associate Professor and Research Director of the Swedish Entrepreneurship Forum Johan Eklund . Research fellow Hyunjoo Kim Karlsson and Professor Andreas Stephan are two other JIBS researchers involved in the project.

The importance of SMEs in Swedish economy is well recognized. However, there are obstacles for SME growth, something which is presented in a survey of Swedish SMEs done by the Swedish Agency for Economic and Regional Growth. Among the four obstacles to growth listed in the survey, access to capital for certain groups and sectors was included.  This project thus examines the link between the regulations in the financial market and SME financing in the Swedish context. Capital requirement for SME loans and possible implementation difficulties in the case of banks that finance SMEs will be studied, as well as current state SME financing.

The project will bring together researchers, as well as practitioners, from several traditional disciplines: economics, financial economics, law, statistics, accounting and corporate governance.