Abstract :
Angel investors invest in high-risk projects and provide an important source of early-stage entrepreneurial financing. When considering an investment, an important decision is how much time to spend on due diligence- deeper investigation into the person, business, and/or industry under consideration. As angels act individually, different from institutional investors with professional advisors, behavioral factors may particularly influence angels' decisions. Such factors are considered in behavioral finance, which is based on the paradigm that markets are not always rational and are driven by other influencing factors such as overconfidence and risk aversion. To provide insight into factors affecting angel investors' time spent on due diligence, we examine the relationships three factors: an angel's investing experience, an angel's assessment of the firm's top management team (TMT), and the firm's stage of development. Keywords: Angel investing, behavioral finance, due diligence, entrepreneurship, entrepreneurial finance, seed capital JEL Codes: C12; C41; C52; G40, G41