Female entrepreneurs and equity crowdfunding: the consequential roles of lead investors and venture stages

Previous research has found that female entrepreneurs are disadvantaged in traditional funding markets. Yet, whether the same conclusion can be drawn in the equity crowdfunding market has not yet been determined. Leveraging both stereotype content theory and warm-glow theory, and based on a data set drawn from 259 projects from three equity crowdfunding platforms in China between October 2014 and April 2019, this study empirically examines the underlying relationship between female entrepreneurs and equity crowdfunding. Using Poisson regression analysis, we find that female entrepreneurs are more likely to be funded through equity crowdfunding than their male counterparts. Moreover, we use the presence or absence of lead investors and venture stage (i.e., early versus late) as potential moderators. Our results reveal that while lead investors augment the financing advantage of female entrepreneurs in the equity crowdfunding market, this advantage is weakened in later-development-stage ventures. The findings of this research contribute to the equity crowdfunding and the female entrepreneurship literature by showing that an entrepreneur’s gender influences equity crowdfunding performance. Our findings also extend previous research by demonstrating that both lead investors and venture stage moderate the impact of gender in the equity crowdfunding market.