Small donors still put their money behind candidates who are already falling, while big donors know when to get out.roundup for 2 – 8 April

The 2016 presidential race has seen a marked difference between how the candidates are raising money for their campaigns with some, such as Democratic hopeful, Bernie Sanders reliant almost entirely on small donations. But how do donors react to candidates’ changing fortunes in the polls and the media? In a new study which looks at this relationship, Dan Cassino finds that small donors are highly responsive to coverage of candidates on ideological media, and that larger donors respond to network coverage. In addition, while both large and small donors are likely to donate even if coverage is positive or negative, large donors will only do so when their candidate is rising in the polls. Small donors, on the other hand, still contribute to those who are already falling.