In the world of early stage investing, there exists a range of structures from the most founder friendly to the most investor friendly. 

The most investor-friendly structure involves some type of a priced round in which the investor receives shares of a class of preferred stock with a negotiated set of enhanced economic, management and

Starting January 1, 2024, virtually all private companies will be required to report information about their beneficial owners to the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network “FinCEN”) under the Corporate Transparency Act (the “CTA”).  But the CTA presents unique analytical and reporting challenges for startups and venture backed companies because of the special economic and governance rights negotiated with investors in early stage and venture funding rounds.Continue Reading Corporate Transparency Act Risks for Startups and Venture-Backed Companies

“Can a digital asset that was originally offered in a securities offering ever be later sold in a manner that does not constitute an offering of a security?”

Such was the question posed by William Hinman, Director of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Division of Corporation Finance, in his speech at the Yahoo Finance All

The Wall Street Journal ominously reported on February 28 that the Securities and Exchange Commission recently issued dozens of subpoenas to initial coin offering issuers and their advisors demanding information about the structure of their ICOs. Although the Commission has yet to officially acknowledge them, the subpoenas are consistent with a series of SEC enforcement

In Part I of this two part series on model structures for seed rounds, I explained how the dramatic decline in the cost of launching an internet-based startup over the last 15 years primarily due to the disruptive effects of open source software and cloud computing has led to a surge in seed stage investing