Strategies of the Development of Entrepreneurship and SME

3.2.4. FINANCIAL ENVIRONMENTAccess to financial is a crucial factor for SMEs start-up, current operations and growth.These SMEs, whose owners have more capital of their own and, therefore, have wider access tofinancing through borrowed capital, have also a better opportunity to receive grant financingfrom EU Structural Funds.The condition of the lending market has changed considerably since 2002. and today itcan be referred to as lending boom. As a result of such a boom, interest rates went down andthe palette of various forms of lending and banking services became much richer. Thus, SMEsaccess to the lending market is a reality.Bulgarian entrepreneurs usually finance their start-up businesses with their own capital.These account for 67% of all the entrepreneurs and only 27% of them borrow a loan. Grantschemes account for about 2% of financing of start-up businesses, and 11% use another typeof financing. In this respect, women entrepreneurs prefer better security – 80 percent of themrely on their own financial resources to start a business, while men entrepreneurs, relying ontheir own funds to start a business account for 61%.On the grounds of the questionnaire survey of ESTAT Agency among businesses, over2/3 of Bulgarian SMEs need additional capital, and for each third SME an amount less or closeto BGN 50 thousand would be enough. Additional capital in the range of BGN 50 to 100thousand is needed by about 16 per cent of SMEs. SMEs seeking between BGN 100 and 250thousand are 9 per cent, and those needing over BGN 250 thousand are close to 12 per cent. Itis interesting to note the relative share of SMEs that do not need additional capital – nearlyevery third one.35