Financing of small and medium-sized companies: analysis of companies from Porto District, Portugal

ABSTRACTIn this article, the purpose is to know and analyze the more used products and financing forms by small and medium companies in the district of Porto, in Portugal. The aim is also to realize the acceptability and the propensity for use of alternative forms of financing and understand what the companies’ difficulties to access credit are. The method used is quantitative and exploratory, with a survey sent to 1,600 companies in the district of Porto, about the different ways of financing used by organizations. The results indicate that bank credit is the main source of financing for small and medium companies, followed by self-financing. The financing by issuing stocks and bonds is residual. The results show three important factors when companies need to finance up: the company’s growth, the cost of borrowing and bureaucratic aspects. Despite the exploratory characteristic of this study, the three factors found are a contribution to the study on the financing of small and medium companies, deserving attention from investors, managers and equity holders.摘要 本文旨在了解并分析葡萄牙波尔图地区中小企业所采用的主流经营产品与融资形式。同时亦旨在探究替代性融资形式的接受度与使用意愿，并剖析企业在信贷获取过程中面临的困境。本研究采用定量探索性研究方法，向波尔图地区的1600家企业发放了关于企业各类融资方式的调查问卷。研究结果显示，银行信贷是中小企业最主要的融资来源，其次为内源融资；而发行股票与债券的融资方式占比极低，仅作为补充性手段。结果表明，企业在产生融资需求时需重点考量三大核心因素：企业成长性、借贷成本与行政审批流程。尽管本研究具有探索性研究属性，但所提炼的三大因素可为中小企业融资相关研究提供有益参考，值得投资者、企业管理者与股权持有者予以关注。