Traditional intermediaries have the ability and the incentive to intertemporarily smooth outcomes. Fintechs, such as peer-to-peer (P2P) lending platforms and equity crowdfunding (ECF) platforms, enable riskier projects without regard to intertemporal smoothing. U.S. data from May 2016 to June 2020 show that COVID-19 had an adverse impact on bank consumer lending. However, counter to our expectations, ECF and P2P are much more stable, timely, and resilient in the COVID-19 crisis compared to bank consumer lending. Moreover, the data indicate that P2P lending is a leading indicator for bank consumer lending and that bank consumer lending substitutes ECF. The policy response—CARES Act—caused: (1) a significant increase in ECF volumes, (2) a substantial rebound to bank consumer lending, and iii) at best, neutralized an already-stabilized level of P2P lending.
In the management literature, the role of learning from experience and its effect on performance has been highlighted. However, little is known about the effects of strategic change on performance due to aspects pertaining to the mobility of learning. Building on different learning theories, we theorize about the effect of strategic change on performance when: (i) strategic change does not require the mobilizing of resources; (ii) strategic change does not involve exposure to a new set of stakeholders; and (iii) time commitment to previous strategies is low. We confront our contentions with data on serial campaign launchers in crowdfunding. The data indicates that changing industry adversely affects fundraising performance due to the specificity of a portion of the accrued learning. This adverse effect is mitigated by venture launching experience and exacerbated following failure. Implications for practitioners and scholars are discussed.
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