What are the different types of finance available to a business

Sources of finance can be grouped through type and time. ‘Types’ include internal finance and external finance whilst ‘time’ involves short, medium and long term. For internal sources of finance the business can use personal finance (which is either short or long term), and retained profit (which is long term). For external sources of finance a business can use a bank overdraft or debt factoring (which are both short term) or venture capital, share capital or loan capital (which are all long term).