Sofica: more than 43 million euros were invested in French cinema in 2020

The Sofica system – which allows individuals to invest in film and audiovisual production – funded 57 million euros in French creation in 2020, reports the association representing Sofica in a report published on Monday, December 6.

Investments in these vehicles remained at a level almost equivalent to that of 2019, representing a notorious source of funding for French creation last year, the other investment channels having for their part largely declined in the context of sanitary closures.

90% of the Sofica fundraising geared towards cinema

Of the 57 M € collected by the 12 approved vehicles, 43.2 M €, or 90% of the budget, was directed towards the cinema, and 11.5 M € towards the financing of audiovisual works. 77% concerned contracts of association with production, and 23% of subscriptions to the capital of production companies.

These investments supported 169 works: 138 cinematographic works (122 fictions, 4 animated films and 12 documentaries for respective amounts of € 32.7m, € 1m and € 0.5m) and 31 audiovisual works (12 fictions, 14 works animation and 5 documentaries) for the respective amounts of 2.8M €, 4.4M € and 0.5M €).

First & second films

40% of cinema investments were devoted to first and second films (69 films), i.e. a higher commitment than that of the five cumulative historical terrestrial channels (TF1, France 2, France 3, Arte and M6), which pre-funded 32 premieres or second films, specifies the association. As for the production association contracts alone, they mainly concerned films with a budget of less than € 8 million.

The Sofica’s support was found in a good part of the critical and commercial successes of the year: with one exception, they participated in the financing of all the French films in official selection at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival (8 films, including Golden Palm Titanium by Julia Ducournau), to the one awarded the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival this year (The event by Audrey Diwan), 58% of French feature films selected by the Académie des Césars in 2021, two of the three feature films shortlisted for the 2022 Oscars, or even half of the films that have passed the 500,000 mark inputs.

Collection 2021

Finally, the report notes that the 2021 collection of Sofica – in progress until December 31 – should have mobilized € 73 million, the largest amount to have been allocated to them by the public authorities. 12 Sofica have been approved by the public authorities for 2021 fundraising. The envelopes collected by these vehicles range between € 3.4 million (Entourage Sofica, Cineaxe 4) and € 14 million (Cinemage 17).

Created in 1985, the Sofica finance the collection of private funds devoted exclusively to film and audiovisual production and distribution. Between 2016 and 2020, they invested on average 55.7M € per year on a total of more than 500 films or film projects.

In return for their investments, the Soficas benefit from revenue rights on the various exploitation media of works and participate in the exploitation risk alongside independent producers and distributors.

Taxation

Individuals who have subscribed to Sofica shares can benefit from an income tax reduction of up to 48%, up to a limit of € 18,000 and 25% of overall net income. To benefit from it, you must buy shares before December 31st.

The tax advantage is attractive, but their profitability is low. In 2019, a report by producer Dominique Boutonnat on private cinema and audiovisual funding estimated that the average annual yield of Sofica, including tax benefit, was less than 2% over the period 2005-2019.