Crowdcube: Turnover falls by half as losses continue
Turnover at funding platform Crowdcube fell by half during its latest financial year as it continued to lose money, it has been revealed.
The London-headquartered business has reported a turnover of £7.5m for 2023, according to newly-filed accounts with Companies House.
The new figure comes after Crowdcube posted a turnover of £14.4m for the 15 months to the end of 2022.
The results have been revealed in accounts filed with Companies House long after the 30 September deadline.
The accounts also show that Crowdcube also made a pre-tax loss of £6.6m in the year, after having lost £8.9m in 2022.
Crowdcube UK turnover fell from £12.9m to £5.9m in 2023 while its earnings from the rest of Europe nudged up from £1.4m to £1.5m.
During the year Crowdcube put its Swedish operations in liquidation “in order to focus on other parts of the European market”.
The business also acquired Semper SAS, which is based in France, for £2.9m.
A statement signed off by the board said: “The company and its subsidiaries remains focused on capturing market share in the equity funding market in the UK and EU and is expecting revenue growth in the financial period ended 31 December, 2024.
In a separate statement, Crowdcube said: “We navigated a very tough market in 2023 – high inflation, higher interest rates and uncertain economic conditions posed challenges for us and many of the businesses we work with.
“The volume of private company financing and venture rounds went into sharp decline. We made adjustments to our cost base throughout the year to ensure we entered 2024 in the strongest possible financial position, with our focus on minimising cash burn to enable sustainable innovation and growth.
“2024 has seen a positive shift in momentum – we have grown revenues consistently quarter on quarter and will end the year having grown the business 30 per cent this year and having reached profitability. Capital raising across Europe is arguably in a better position than it was a year ago.
“Primary investments are up year-on-year and our secondaries business is gaining traction following our investment into our secondaries offering in 2023.
“We have delivered more secondary liquidity transactions this year than the previous 10 years combined, as delayed IPO plans and a contraction in the venture markets are pushing businesses to seek alternative liquidity solutions for employees and early shareholders such as MoneyBox.
“Our portfolio continues to mature, creating opportunities for monetisation. We now manage over £800m in private market securities for more than 450,000 investors across 120+ countries.
“To date, we’ve raised over £1.5bn through the platform. Among our top 20 positions, we manage 182 million individual securities valued at more than £700m on behalf of our investors.
“Our European business continues to grow – we’ve seen a 200 per ent increase in the number of businesses successfully funded in Q3 compared to the same period last year – and 2024 is on track to be our strongest year yet, driven by a more active investor base and an increasingly buoyant market.”
The Crowdcube accounts come after rival Seedrs suffered a 10 per cent fall in its revenue after fewer deals and less investment were made through its crowdfunding platform in 2023.
The business reported a revenue of £6.1m for the 12 months, down from the £6.8m it posted in 2022. Seedrs also saw its pre-tax loss widen from £9.6m to £9.9m in 2023.
Seedrs was acquired by US-based equity crowdfunding platform Republic in 2021 in a $100m (£76.6m) deal.
In July, Seedrs announced it would start trading under a new name – Republic Europe.