Bruce Billson releases crowdsourced equity options; Retail sales jump in June: Midday Roundup

Businesses have come out in support of proposals to make it easier to access capital through crowdsourced equity funding after it was outlined in a consultation paper released by Small Business Minister Bruce Billson today.

A key feature of the long-awaited for policy is it will also extend crowdsourced equity funding to proprietary companies.

Billson says the debate around the limit of 50 non‑employee shareholders for proprietary companies and the ‘small scale offerings’ exception to the disclosure requirements are of particular interest to small businesses and entrepreneurs

AVCAL chief executive Yasser El-Ansary welcomed the progress made on the policy framework supporting equity crowdfunding.

“Australia has been lagging behind other developed economies in this area and we have some catching up to do,” he said.

Jonny Wilkinson, co-founder of Equitise, also welcomed the proposal.

“Having launched in New Zealand earlier this year, we are excited about launching retail equity crowdfunding offers in the Australian market later this year.”  

Retail sales jump in June

Retailers have welcomed the latest figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics that show retail sales figures rose by 0.7% for the month of June.

National Retail Association chief executive Trevor Evans attributed the seasonally adjusted increase, which compared to a 0.3% increase in May, to the federal government’s small business-focused budget.

“It’s pleasing to see that the measures included in the budget, particularly the $20,000 instant write-off for purchases for small businesses, have prompted the right response,” Evans said in a statement.

“We would expect to see these kinds of results for June each year until 2017, when the budget measures are scheduled to come to an end.”

Sales increased for household goods (2.2%), other retailing (2%) and cafes, restaurants and takeaway food (1.2%). But there were falls in sales for clothing, footwear and personal accessories (-1.4%), food retailing (-0.1%) and department stores (-0.1%).

Share up on open

The Australian share market was in positive territory heading into lunchtime, despite falls on Wall Street overnight.

The S&P/ASX200 benchmark was up 0.6%, rising 35.2 points to 5714.5 points at 12.20pm AEST. On Monday, the Dow Jones closed down 0.52%, falling 91.66 points to 17598.2 points.