Anyone can put the word “regulated” on a website. It costs nothing and means nothing on its own. If you are about to send money to a crowdfunding platform, the only claim that matters is one you can verify yourself in a public register — and it takes about two minutes.
Here is exactly how.
What You Are Looking For
In the European Union, a platform that raises investment from the public must hold an ECSP licence — authorisation as a European Crowdfunding Service Provider under Regulation (EU) 2020/1503, known as ECSPR.
Three things follow from that, and they are the three things to check:
- A national regulator granted the licence — the financial supervisory authority of one EU member state.
- The platform appears in that regulator’s public register, with a registration number.
- It also appears in ESMA’s EU-wide register, which is what makes the licence valid across all member states rather than just the country that issued it.
If any of the three is missing, the “EU-regulated” claim on the homepage is doing work the paperwork does not support.
The Two-Minute Check
Step 1 — Find the legal entity name
Not the brand. The company. Scroll to the footer, or open the Terms, Imprint or Legal page. You are looking for something like “XYZ Crowd S.A.” or “XYZ Platform OÜ” — a registered company with a legal form.
If a platform makes this hard to find, that is itself information.
Step 2 — Search the ESMA register
ESMA — the European Securities and Markets Authority — publishes a register of every authorised crowdfunding service provider in the Union. It is public, free, and searchable. Look for the legal entity name from Step 1.
The entry tells you which national regulator authorised the firm, when, and which services it is permitted to provide.
Step 3 — Cross-check with the national regulator
The ESMA register points to a home-state authority — ASF in Romania, AMF in France, BaFin in Germany, AFM in the Netherlands, CSSF in Luxembourg, Finansinspektionen in Sweden, and so on. Each maintains its own register with a registration number.
A platform that is genuinely licensed will give you that number without being asked. Solar Plus Garden’s planned platform, for example, publishes its ASF register number — you can read it on the page about that platform and check it yourself. That is what a verifiable claim looks like.
What Trips People Up
“Regulated” without saying by whom
The most common. A firm can be registered as a company, registered for VAT, or a member of a trade body, and describe all of that as “regulated”. None of it is an ECSP licence.
A licence for something else
Payment institution, e-money institution, investment firm under MiFID — all real authorisations, none of them ECSPR. A payment licence lets a firm move money. It does not permit raising investment from the public in a crowdfunding offer.
A group company holds the licence, not the one you contract with
Check that the entity named in the register is the entity named in the documents you are asked to sign. Groups can be structured so that the licensed company and the contracting company are not the same.
A transitional or pending status
ECSPR came into application in November 2021 with a transitional period. “Applied for” is not “authorised”. If the register does not list the firm, it is not authorised, whatever the timeline on the website says.
What the Licence Does and Does Not Tell You
A valid ECSP licence tells you the platform is supervised, must publish a Key Investment Information Sheet for every project, must assess whether an investment suits a non-sophisticated investor, must give a reflection period, and must keep client funds properly handled.
It tells you nothing whatsoever about whether a specific project on that platform is a good investment. The licence regulates the intermediary, not the outcome. Licensed platforms list projects that fail. That is not a scandal — it is what investing is.
So the licence check is a floor, not a recommendation. Clear it first, then do the actual work of assessing the project.
Non-EU Platforms
ECSPR is EU law. A platform outside the Union will be authorised — or not — under its own regime: the FCA in the UK, the SEC and FINRA in the United States, and so on. The same principle applies: find the entity, find the register, find the number.
Where a firm claims to serve EU investors from outside the EU, ask specifically under what basis. The answer should be concrete.
A Short Checklist
- Legal entity name found, not just the brand
- Listed in the ESMA register of crowdfunding service providers
- Listed in the home-state regulator’s register, with a number
- The licensed entity is the same one named in your contract
- Authorisation is current, not pending or transitional
- A KIIS is provided for the specific project
Six lines. Two minutes. It is the cheapest due diligence available and almost nobody does it.
This page is general information about how to verify a regulatory authorisation. It is not legal or investment advice, and it is not a recommendation of any platform. Registers change; always check the current entry rather than relying on a page like this one. Published by Solar Plus Garden, which plans to raise through an authorised ECSP and therefore has an obvious interest in this subject — verify everything independently.
