IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jbvent/v32y2017i5p519-535.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Diversification, risk, and returns in venture capital

Author

Listed:
  • Buchner, Axel
  • Mohamed, Abdulkadir
  • Schwienbacher, Armin

Abstract

We explore an alternative, finance theory-based explanation for the documented positive relationship between fund diversification (or lack of fund specialization) and performance in venture capital (VC). Our proposed “Risk Hypothesis” posits that the expected negative impact of diversification on fund risk induces fund managers to endogenously select riskier investments, which in turn leads to higher performance of more diversified funds. While other channels may also be at play, we provide results that support this hypothesis for an international sample of VC funds. However, this effect is weakened when expertise is limited. The study offers implications of how VC fund managers' investment decisions are influenced by strategic portfolio considerations, which in turn affect which innovative ventures receive funding.

Suggested Citation

  • Buchner, Axel & Mohamed, Abdulkadir & Schwienbacher, Armin, 2017. "Diversification, risk, and returns in venture capital," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 32(5), pages 519-535.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jbvent:v:32:y:2017:i:5:p:519-535
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusvent.2017.05.005
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0883902617304056
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jbusvent.2017.05.005?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Yi Yang & Vadake K. Narayanan & Donna M. De Carolis, 2014. "The relationship between portfolio diversification and firm value: The evidence from corporate venture capital activity," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(13), pages 1993-2011, December.
    2. N. Berger, Allen & F. Udell, Gregory, 1998. "The economics of small business finance: The roles of private equity and debt markets in the financial growth cycle," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 22(6-8), pages 613-673, August.
    3. David T. Robinson & Berk A. Sensoy, 2013. "Do Private Equity Fund Managers Earn Their Fees? Compensation, Ownership, and Cash Flow Performance," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 26(11), pages 2760-2797.
    4. Thomas Hellmann & Manju Puri, 2002. "Venture Capital and the Professionalization of Start‐Up Firms: Empirical Evidence," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(1), pages 169-197, February.
    5. Humphery-Jenner, Mark, 2013. "Diversification in Private Equity Funds: On Knowledge Sharing, Risk Aversion, and Limited Attention," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 48(5), pages 1545-1572, October.
    6. Cochrane, John H., 2005. "The risk and return of venture capital," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(1), pages 3-52, January.
    7. Douglas J. Cumming, 2006. "The Determinants of Venture Capital Portfolio Size: Empirical Evidence," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 79(3), pages 1083-1126, May.
    8. Mikko Jääskeläinen & Markku Maula & Tuukka Seppä, 2006. "Allocation of Attention to Portfolio Companies and the Performance of Venture Capital Firms," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 30(2), pages 185-206, March.
    9. Robinson, David T. & Sensoy, Berk A., 2016. "Cyclicality, performance measurement, and cash flow liquidity in private equity," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 122(3), pages 521-543.
    10. Cressy, Robert & Munari, Federico & Malipiero, Alessandro, 2007. "Playing to their strengths? Evidence that specialization in the private equity industry confers competitive advantage," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 13(4), pages 647-669, September.
    11. Kanniainen, Vesa & Keuschnigg, Christian, 2003. "The optimal portfolio of start-up firms in venture capital finance," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 9(5), pages 521-534, November.
    12. Ruhnka, John C. & Young, John E., 1991. "Some hypotheses about risk in venture capital investing," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 6(2), pages 115-133, March.
    13. Michael Ewens & Charles M. Jones & Matthew Rhodes-Kropf, 2013. "The Price of Diversifiable Risk in Venture Capital and Private Equity," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 26(8), pages 1854-1889.
    14. Andrew Ang & Joseph Chen & Yuhang Xing, 2006. "Downside Risk," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 19(4), pages 1191-1239.
      • Andrew Ang & Joseph Chen & Yuhang Xing, 2005. "Downside risk," Proceedings, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    15. Gompers, Paul A, 1995. "Optimal Investment, Monitoring, and the Staging of Venture Capital," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 50(5), pages 1461-1489, December.
    16. Jose Manuel Campa & Simi Kedia, 2002. "Explaining the Diversification Discount," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(4), pages 1731-1762, August.
    17. Douglas Cumming & Uwe Walz, 2010. "Private equity returns and disclosure around the world," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 41(4), pages 727-754, May.
    18. April Knill, 2009. "Should Venture Capitalists Put All Their Eggs in One Basket? Diversification versus Pure‐Play Strategies in Venture Capital," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 38(3), pages 441-486, September.
    19. Cumming, Douglas & Schmidt, Daniel & Walz, Uwe, 2010. "Legality and venture capital governance around the world," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 54-72, January.
    20. Bernile, Gennaro & Cumming, Douglas & Lyandres, Evgeny, 2007. "The size of venture capital and private equity fund portfolios," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 13(4), pages 564-590, September.
    21. Jackson, William E. & Bates, Timothy & Bradford, William D., 2012. "Does venture capitalist activism improve investment performance?," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 342-354.
    22. Paul Gompers & Anna Kovner & Josh Lerner, 2009. "Specialization and Success: Evidence from Venture Capital," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 18(3), pages 817-844, September.
    23. Lee, Peggy M. & Wahal, Sunil, 2004. "Grandstanding, certification and the underpricing of venture capital backed IPOs," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 73(2), pages 375-407, August.
    24. J. Tobin, 1958. "Liquidity Preference as Behavior Towards Risk," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 25(2), pages 65-86.
    25. Sharon F. Matusik & Markus A. Fitza, 2012. "Diversification in the venture capital industry: leveraging knowledge under uncertainty," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(4), pages 407-426, April.
    26. Norton, Edgar & Tenenbaum, Bernard H., 1993. "Specialization versus diversification as a venture capital investment strategy," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 8(5), pages 431-442, September.
    27. Cassar, Gavin, 2004. "The financing of business start-ups," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 19(2), pages 261-283, March.
    28. Bali, Turan G. & Demirtas, K. Ozgur & Levy, Haim, 2009. "Is There an Intertemporal Relation between Downside Risk and Expected Returns?," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 44(4), pages 883-909, August.
    29. Paul Gompers & Josh Lerner, 1998. "Venture Capital Distributions: Short-Run and Long-Run Reactions," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 53(6), pages 2161-2183, December.
    30. Robert S. Harris & Tim Jenkinson & Steven N. Kaplan, 2014. "Private Equity Performance: What Do We Know?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 69(5), pages 1851-1882, October.
    31. Phalippou, Ludovic, 2010. "Venture capital funds: Flow-performance relationship and performance persistence," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(3), pages 568-577, March.
    32. Arthur Korteweg & Morten Sorensen, 2010. "Risk and Return Characteristics of Venture Capital-Backed Entrepreneurial Companies," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 23(10), pages 3738-3772, October.
    33. Krohmer, Philipp & Lauterbach, Rainer & Calanog, Victor, 2009. "The bright and dark side of staging: Investment performance and the varying motivations of private equity firms," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 33(9), pages 1597-1609, September.
    34. Gifford, Sharon, 1997. "Limited attention and the role of the venture capitalist," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 12(6), pages 459-482, November.
    35. Francesco Franzoni & Eric Nowak & Ludovic Phalippou, 2012. "Private Equity Performance and Liquidity Risk," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 67(6), pages 2341-2373, December.
    36. Cumming, Douglas & Dai, Na, 2011. "Fund size, limited attention and valuation of venture capital backed firms," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 18(1), pages 2-15, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Dimitris Christopoulos & Stefan Koeppl & Monika Köppl-Turyna, 2022. "Syndication networks and company survival: evidence from European venture capital deals," Venture Capital, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(2), pages 105-135, April.
    2. Xiao Hu & Jiayi Wang & Banggang Wu & Taiyang Zhao, 2022. "Specialist or new entrant: Who is the ideal investor for a new venture?," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 43(6), pages 2055-2065, September.
    3. Malmström, Malin & Voitkane, Aija & Johansson, Jeaneth & Wincent, Joakim, 2020. "What do they think and what do they say? Gender bias, entrepreneurial attitude in writing and venture capitalists’ funding decisions," Journal of Business Venturing Insights, Elsevier, vol. 13(C).
    4. Aleenajitpong, Natdanai & Leemakdej, Arnat, 2021. "Venture Capital Networks in Southeast Asia: Network characteristics and cohesive subgroups," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    5. Köppl-Turyna, Monika & Köppl, Stefan & Christopulos, Dimitris, 2023. "How to support cleantech start-ups? Lessons from European venture-capital deals," Research Papers 25, EcoAustria – Institute for Economic Research.
    6. Buchner, Axel & Mohamed, Abdulkadir & Schwienbacher, Armin, 2020. "Herd behaviour in buyout investments," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 60(C).
    7. Parker, Simon C., 2020. "Editorial: On submitting economics articles to JBV," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 35(4).
    8. Antretter, Torben & Sirén, Charlotta & Grichnik, Dietmar & Wincent, Joakim, 2020. "Should business angels diversify their investment portfolios to achieve higher performance? The role of knowledge access through co-investment networks," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 35(5).
    9. Hull, Tyler J., 2021. "The effect of venture capitalists straying from their industry comfort zones," Journal of Business Venturing Insights, Elsevier, vol. 16(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Rin, Marco Da & Hellmann, Thomas & Puri, Manju, 2013. "A Survey of Venture Capital Research," Handbook of the Economics of Finance, in: G.M. Constantinides & M. Harris & R. M. Stulz (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Finance, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 573-648, Elsevier.
    2. Buchner, Axel & Mohamed, Abdulkadir & Schwienbacher, Armin, 2020. "Herd behaviour in buyout investments," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 60(C).
    3. Axel Buchner & Susanne Espenlaub & Arif Khurshed & Abdulkadir Mohamed, 2018. "Cross-border venture capital investments: The impact of foreignness on returns," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 49(5), pages 575-604, July.
    4. Jackson, William E. & Bates, Timothy & Bradford, William D., 2012. "Does venture capitalist activism improve investment performance?," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 342-354.
    5. Humphery-Jenner, Mark & Suchard, Jo-Ann, 2013. "Foreign VCs and venture success: Evidence from China," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 21(C), pages 16-35.
    6. André Gygax & Anna Griffiths, 2007. "Do venture capitalists imitate portfolio size?," Financial Markets and Portfolio Management, Springer;Swiss Society for Financial Market Research, vol. 21(1), pages 69-94, March.
    7. Lopez-de-Silanes, Florencio & Phalippou, Ludovic & Gottschalg, Olivier, 2010. "Giants at the Gate: On the Cross-section of Private Equity Investment Returns," MPRA Paper 28487, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Buchner, Axel & Mohamed, Abdulkadir & Schwienbacher, Armin, 2016. "Does risk explain persistence in private equity performance?," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 18-35.
    9. Andrew Metrick & Ayako Yasuda, 2011. "Venture Capital and Other Private Equity: a Survey," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 17(4), pages 619-654, September.
    10. Wang, Lanfang & Wang, Susheng, 2012. "Economic freedom and cross-border venture capital performance," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 19(1), pages 26-50.
    11. Robinson, David T. & Sensoy, Berk A., 2016. "Cyclicality, performance measurement, and cash flow liquidity in private equity," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 122(3), pages 521-543.
    12. Jia, Ning & Wang, Dan, 2017. "Skin in the game: General partner capital commitment, investment behavior and venture capital fund performance," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 110-130.
    13. Chortareas, Georgios E. & Girardone, Claudia & Ventouri, Alexia, 2013. "Financial freedom and bank efficiency: Evidence from the European Union," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(4), pages 1223-1231.
    14. Matthias Huss & Daniel Steger, 2020. "Diversification and Fund Performance—An Analysis of Buyout Funds," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 13(6), pages 1-17, June.
    15. Cumming, Douglas J. & Grilli, Luca & Murtinu, Samuele, 2017. "Governmental and independent venture capital investments in Europe: A firm-level performance analysis," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 439-459.
    16. Carolin Bock & Maximilian Schmidt, 2015. "Should I stay, or should I go? – How fund dynamics influence venture capital exit decisions," Review of Financial Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 27(1), pages 68-82, November.
    17. April Knill, 2009. "Should Venture Capitalists Put All Their Eggs in One Basket? Diversification versus Pure‐Play Strategies in Venture Capital," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 38(3), pages 441-486, September.
    18. Johannes Wallmeroth & Peter Wirtz & Alexander Peter Groh, 2017. "Institutional Seed Financing, Angel Financing, and Crowdfunding of Entrepreneurial Ventures: A Literature Review," Working Papers hal-01527999, HAL.
    19. Buchner, Axel & Wagner, Niklas F., 2017. "Rewarding risk-taking or skill? The case of private equity fund managers," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 14-32.
    20. Brown, Gregory W. & Gredil, Oleg R. & Kaplan, Steven N., 2019. "Do private equity funds manipulate reported returns?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 132(2), pages 267-297.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Venture capital; Diversification; Risk; Entrepreneurial finance; Venture finance;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G24 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Investment Banking; Venture Capital; Brokerage
    • G23 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Non-bank Financial Institutions; Financial Instruments; Institutional Investors

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:jbvent:v:32:y:2017:i:5:p:519-535. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jbusvent .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.