A way of raising money from a large number of investors who make relatively small financial contributions to fund a business, project, venture or cause. Crowd-sourced funding (CSF) is usually undertaken using online platforms (for example, social media). CSF can be used for capital raising by start-ups and other small to medium-sized companies that may not have easy access to traditional methods of capital markets and venture capital fundraising.

In Australia, proprietary companies and unlisted public companies may be eligible to make an offer of shares under the crowd-sourced equity funding regime (CSF regime) in the Corporations Act 2001 (Cth). For more information, see Practice note, Crowd-sourced funding: public and proprietary companies and ASIC Regulatory Guide 261: Crowd-sourced funding: Guide for companies.