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It’s not often that the House of Representatives votes nearly unanimously on anything noteworthy these days, but that’s exactly what the House did on July 17 in voting 406-4 for the “JOBS and Investor Confidence Act of 2018”, also known on the street as “JOBS Act 3.0”, which is the latest iteration of the effort to improve on the capital markets reform initiative started in the original JOBS Act of 2012. JOBS Act 3.0 consists of 32 individual pieces of legislation that have passed the Financial Services Committee or the House, the substance of several of which I have blogged about previously. If passed by the Senate in some form or another and signed by the President, the reforms included in JOBS Act 3.0 will continue the process of removing unreasonable impediments to capital formation by early stage companies and address perceived problems with the original JOBS Act.

The highlights of JOBS Act 3.0 passed by the House are as follows:

Demo Days: Helping Angels Lead Our Startups Act” or the “HALOS Act”

The bill would direct the SEC to amend Regulation D to make clear that activities associated with demo day or pitch night events satisfying certain criteria would not constitute prohibited “general solicitation” under Regulation D. Specifically, the new exemption would cover events with specified types of sponsors, such as “angel investor groups”, venture forums and venture capital associations, so long as the event advertising doesn’t refer to any specific offering of securities by the issuer, the sponsor doesn’t provide investment advice to attendees or engage in investment negotiations with attendees, charge certain fees, or receive certain compensation, and no specific information regarding a securities offering is communicated at the event beyond the type and amount of securities being offered, the amount of securities already subscribed for and the intended use of proceeds from the offering.

I previously blogged about the issue of demo days and the ban on general solicitation here.

Private Company M&A Brokers: Small Business Mergers, Acquisitions, Sales, and Brokerage Simplification Act of 2017

The bill would exempt from SEC broker-dealer registration mergers-and-acquisitions brokers that facilitate transfers of ownership in privately held companies with earnings or revenues under a specified threshold. The exemption would not apply to any broker who takes custody of funds or securities, participates in a public offering of registered securities, engages in a transaction involving certain shell companies, provides or facilitates financing related to the transfer of ownership, represents both buyer and seller without disclosure and consent, assists in the formation of a group of buyers, engages in transferring ownership to a passive buyer, binds a party to a transfer of ownership or is a “bad actor”.

Since 2014, private company M&A brokers could at best be guided by an SEC no-action letter, although there had been previous Congressional efforts to codify the protection, which I had blogged about here.

Accredited Investor Definition: Fair Investment Opportunities for Professional Experts Act

The bill would direct the SEC to expand the definition of “accredited investor” under Regulation D beyond the net worth and income test to include individuals licensed as a broker or investment advisor and individuals determined by the SEC to have demonstrable education or job experience to qualify as having professional knowledge of a subject related to a particular investment.

Venture Exchanges: Main Street Growth Act

Although the JOBS Act created an IPO on-ramp for emerging growth companies, it did comparatively little to address secondary market trading in these companies. This portion of the bill seeks to remedy that shortcoming by providing a tailored trading platform for EGCs and stocks with distressed liquidity. Companies that choose to list on a venture exchange would have their shares traded on a single venue, thereby concentrating liquidity and exempting their shares from rules that are more appropriate for deeply liquid and highly valued stocks. Venture exchanges would also be afforded the flexibility to develop appropriate “tick sizes” that could help incentivize market makers to trade in the shares of companies listed on the exchange.

VC Fund Exemption – Investment Advisor Registration: Developing and Empowering our Aspiring Leaders Act

Dodd-Frank requires private equity and hedge fund managers to register with the SEC under the Investment Advisors Act but allows venture capital fund managers to become “exempt reporting advisors” and be relieved from the regulatory requirements encountered by registered investment advisors. Currently, to qualify under the venture capital fund definition and register with the SEC as an exempt reporting advisor, VCs must ensure that more than 80% of their activities are in qualifying investments, which are defined only as direct investments in private companies.

The bill would require the SEC to revise the definitions of a qualifying portfolio company and a qualifying investment to include an emerging growth company and the equity securities of an emerging growth company, “whether acquired directly from the company or in a secondary acquisition”, for purposes of the exemption from registration for venture capital fund advisers under the Investment Advisers Act.  A company qualifies as an emerging growth company if it has total annual gross revenues of less than $1.07 billion during its most recently completed fiscal year and continues to be an emerging growth company for the first five fiscal years after it completes an IPO unless its total annual gross revenues are $1.07 billion or more, it has issued more than $1 billion in non-convertible debt in the past three years or it becomes a “large accelerated filer”.

Founders often leave startups, voluntarily or involuntarily, and it may be in everyone’s interest to have their shares purchased by other existing shareholders rather than sold to an outsider or held by a disgruntled founder.  VC funds should have the flexibility to be able to buy those shares.  Similarly, the inclusion of emerging growth companies in the category of qualifying portfolio company will benefit the innovation ecosystem by encouraging VC funds to invest further in their portfolio companies post-IPO.

Special Purpose Crowdfunding Vehicles: Crowdfunding Amendments Act

One of the perceived defects of the rules governing equity crowdfunding under Regulation CF is the ineligibility of investment vehicles. Many accredited investor crowdfunding platforms like AngeList and OurCrowd operate on an investment fund model, whereby they recruit investors under Regulation D to invest in a special purpose vehicle whose only purpose is to invest in an operating company. Essentially, a lead investor validates a company’s valuation, strategy and investment worthiness. Traditionally, angel investors have operated in groups and often follow a lead investor, a model which puts all investors on a level playing field. The additional benefit to the portfolio company from this model is that the company ends up with only one additional investor on its cap table, instead of the hundreds that can result under current rules.  Due to the fear of having to collect thousands of signatures every time shareholder consent is required for a transaction, higher-quality issuers with other financing options are less likely to crowdfund without a single-purpose-vehicle. I suspect that many companies are shying away from Reg CF or not reaching potential raise targets because of this reason alone.

The bill would allow equity crowdfunding offerings under Reg CF through special purpose vehicles that issue only one class of securities, receive no compensation in connection with the offering and are advised by a registered investment adviser.  Special-purpose-vehicles allow small investors to invest alongside a sophisticated lead investor with a fiduciary duty to advocate for their interests. The lead investor may negotiate better terms and represent small investors on the board.  Retail investors don’t enjoy these benefits under Reg CF.

Ever since the Federal securities laws were enacted in 1933, all offers and sales of securities in the United States had to either be registered with the SEC or satisfy an exemption from registration. The commonly used private offering exemption, however, prohibited any act of general solicitation. The JOBS Act of 2012 JOBS Act signingcreated a new variation to the private offering exemption under Rule 506 of Regulation D that permits online offers and other acts of general solicitation, but issuers selling under this new Rule 506(c) may sell only to accredited investors and must use reasonable methods to verify investor status.

Starting today, companies will be permitted to offer and sell securities online to anyone, not just accredited investors, without SEC registration. This is pursuant to Title III of the JOBS Act and the final crowdfunding rules promulgated by the SEC called Regulation Crowdfunding.  The potential for Title III Crowdfundingequity crowdfunding is enormous and potentially disruptive.  It is believed that approximately 93% of the U.S. population consists of non-accredited investors who have an estimated $30 trillion stashed away in investment accounts.  If only one percent of that amount got redirected to equity crowdfunding, the resulting $300 billion dollars invested would be ten times larger than the VC industry.  Hence the potential.

The reality, however, is not as encouraging. In the interest of investor protection, Congress in JOBS Act Title III and the SEC in Regulation Crowdfunding created a heavily regulated and expensive regime that many fear will severely limit the prospects of equity crowdfunding.  The rules include a $1 million issuer cap, strict dollar limits on investors, disclosure requirements and funding portal liability, registration and gatekeeper obligations.

wefunderSEC registration for funding portals began on January 29. But as of last week, only five portals had completed the registration process: Wefunder Portal LLC, SI Portal LLC dba Seedinvest.com, CFS LLC dba seedinvestCrowdFundingSTAR.com, NextSeed US LLC and StartEngine Capital LLC.  Over 30 others are apparently awaiting approval.  Of the two best known and most successful non-equity crowdfunding portals, only Indiegogo has declared an intention to get in the Title III funding portal business; Kickstarter has so far declined.

The likely reason for the apparent lackluster funding portal activity so far is the restrictive regulatory regime referred to above, the burden of which falls disproportionately on funding portals. None of this should be a surprise.  Several key aspects of the crowdfunding rules were contentiously debated at the Congressional level and later during SEC rulemaking.  Opponents asserted that retail equity crowdfunding is an invitation for massive fraud against those who can least afford it and so believe Title III is a mistake.  Proponents advocated against several of the more restrictive rules but conceded on these points in order to get Title III passed.  And because the legislation itself was so prescriptive and granular, there was only room for marginal improvement in the final SEC rules relative to those proposed in the initial release.

Regrettably, there’s painful precedent for securities exemptions so restrictive that no one used them.  Regulation A allowed for a mini-public offering through a streamlined filing with the SEC.  But issuers were capped at $5 million and were forced to go through merit review in each state where they offered the securities.  The result:  hardly anyone used Reg A.  In recognition of this, Title IV of the JOBS Act reformed Reg A by increasing the cap to $50 million and, more importantly, preempting state blue sky review for so-called Tier II offerings which must satisfy investor protection requirements.

In an effort to prevent Title III from a fate similar to pre-reform Reg A, legislation has been introduced in Congress to increase the issuer cap, allow for special purpose vehicles, remove the $25 million asset cap on the exemption from the 500 shareholder SEC registration trigger and allow issuers to test the waters. See my previous blog post here on the proposed Fix Crowdfunding Act.

It may seem somewhat premature to advocate for reform when the rules have barely gone live. But given the time necessary for the legislative process to run its course, and inasmuch as the indications are already fairly clear that both issuers and funding portals remain skeptical about Title III crowdfunding, it makes sense to begin the process now of introducing necessary common sense reform of Title III.

SEC logoIn its most recent meeting on September 23, 2015, the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Advisory Committee on Small and Emerging Companies recommended specific reforms that would significantly liberalize the rules governing private offering intermediaries and make it easier for companies to use them. If adopted, these reforms could greatly enhance the capacity of startups and early stage companies to reach investors and raise capital.

Background

More than 95% of private offerings in America rely on the exemptions provided by Regulation D, particularly Rule 506. But fewer than 15% of Reg D offerings use a financial intermediary, such as a placement agent, broker-dealer or finder. This is largely due to the general requirement financial intermediariesthat anyone receiving a transaction based success fee in a securities transaction be registered with the SEC as a broker-dealer (and subject to regulatory oversight as such) and be a member of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority or FINRA. This is so even if the intermediary’s participation in an offering is limited to giving the issuer the name of a prospective investor, and refrains from engaging in other services often provided by full service intermediaries, such as holding funds or securities, helping to negotiate the transaction, assisting in the preparation of offering materials or providing investment advice. The risks to both intermediaries and issuers of paying a success fee to a non-registered intermediary is fairly draconian. For intermediaries, the risk is forfeiture of the success fee, as issuers could use non-registration as a defense for non-payment. For issuers, the risk is rescission, i.e., that all investors in a round could have the right to demand their money back.

The Committee’s Recommendations

The Committee prefaced its recommendations by stating that imposing only limited regulatory requirements on private placement intermediaries whose activities are restricted to specified parameters, do not hold customer funds or securities and deal only with accredited investors would enhance capital formation and promote job creation without materially undermining investor protections. Presumably, the Committee is asserting that such unregistered intermediaries should be allowed to receive a success fee.

The Committee then made the following recommendations to the SEC:

  1.  Take steps to clarify the current ambiguity in broker-dealer regulation by determining that persons that receive transaction-based compensation solely for providing names of or introductions to prospective investors are not subject to registration as a broker under the Securities Exchange Act.
  2. Exempt intermediaries that are actively involved in the discussions, negotiations and structuring, as well as the solicitation of prospective investors, for private financings on a regular basis from broker registration at the federal level, conditioned upon registration as a broker under State law.
  3. Spearhead a joint effort with the North American Securities Administrators Association and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority to ensure coordinated State regulation and adoption of measured regulation that is transparent, responsive to the needs of small businesses for capital, proportional to the risks to which investors in such offerings are exposed, and capable of early implementation and ongoing enforcement.
  4. Take immediate intermediary steps to begin to address this set of issues incrementally instead of waiting until development of a comprehensive solution.

A recording of the September 23 Committee meeting could be accessed here.

SEC 2August 6, 2015 was a productive day for the Staff of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Division of Corporation Finance on the issue of the prohibition on general solicitation in the context of online private offerings under Rule 506(b). My last blog post, entitled “It’s Complicated”: Establishing “Preexisting Relationships” with Prospective Investors, analyzed the Citizen VC no-action letter delivered that day dealing with establishing pre-existing relationships with investors online to demonstrate the absence of general solicitation in a Rule 506 offering. On the same day, the Staff provided additional guidance on the issue of general solicitation in the form of new Compliance and Disclosure Interpretations (“CDIs”).

Background

Rule 502(c) promulgated under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, prohibits an issuer from offering or selling securities by any form of general solicitation or general advertising when conducting certain offerings intended to be exempt from registration under Regulation D. The prohibition on general solicitation has been perceived as perhaps the single biggest obstacle to raising capital in the private general solicitationmarkets. In September 2013, the SEC released final rules for a new offering exemption contained in Rule 506(c) that permits general solicitation efforts, provided securities are sold only to accredited investors and the issuer uses reasonable methods to verify that each purchaser is an accredited investor. What constitutes reasonable verification methods will depend on the facts and circumstances of each case, but generally involves a more intrusive inquiry than an offering under traditional Rule 506(b), which is why most private offerings are still being conducted under Rule 506(b) despite the prohibition on general solicitation.

New Guidance

The new CDIs come in the form of Q&As, some of which provide official confirmation of existing practice while others provide new flexibility in online offering activities. Here’s an outline of the new CDIs:

Factual Business Information

Factual business information that does not condition the public mind or arouse public interest in a securities offering is not deemed an offer and may be disseminated widely. In the new guidance, the Staff stated that factual business information is a facts and circumstances concept, but is typically limited to information about the issuer’s business, financial condition, products or services, and generally does not include predictions, projections, forecasts or opinions with respect to valuation of a security, nor for a continuously offered fund would it include information about past performance of the fund.

Angel Investors

angelThe Staff confirmed that it is possible for angel investors who have a relationship with an issuer to make introductions to other prospective investors in their personal network and share information about a securities offering without such issuer being deemed to engage in a general solicitation. Whether or not a general solicitation has occurred requires a facts and circumstances analysis, but an issuer could rely on such network to establish a reasonable belief that other offerees in the network have the necessary financial experience and sophistication.

Establishing “Pre-Existing” and “Substantive” Relationships

A relationship with an offeree is “pre-existing” for purposes of demonstrating the absence of general solicitation under Rule 502(c) when the relationship was formed prior to the commencement of the securities offering or, alternatively, when it was established through either a registered broker-dealer or investment adviser prior to the registered broker-dealer or investment adviser participating in the offering. Similarly, a relationship is “substantive” for purposes of demonstrating the absence of general solicitation under Rule 502(c) when the issuer (or a person acting on its behalf) has sufficient information to evaluate, and does in fact evaluate, a prospective offeree’s financial circumstances and sophistication, in determining his status as an accredited or sophisticated investor. Self-certification alone (by checking a box) without any other knowledge of a person’s financial circumstances or sophistication is not sufficient to form a “substantive” relationship.

Demo Days

Whether or not “demo days” or “pitch days” constitute general solicitation is also – you guessed it – a factsimages12NM2J0D and circumstances question. If the presentation does not discuss the securities being offered, the securities laws are not implicated. Where the presentation does discuss the securities being offered, however, attendance at the demo day or pitch day should be limited to persons with whom the issuer or the organizer of the event has a pre-existing, substantive relationship or who have been contacted through an informal, personal network as described above under “Angel Investors”. For more on this issue involving demo days, see my previous blog post “Will Your Demo Day Presentation Violate the Securities Laws?”.

In my last post, I blogged about online funding platforms. In that post, I described the typical model of indirect investing through a special purpose vehicle (“SPV”) with the platform sponsor taking a carried interest in the SPV’s profits from the portfolio company and no ourcrowdtransaction fee, as a means of avoiding broker-dealer regulation. I also discussed the concept of a pre-screened password protected member-only website as a means of establishing a preexisting fundablerelationship with prospective investors and thus avoiding the use of any act of “general solicitation,” which would otherwise violate the rules of the registration exemption under Rule 506(b).

SEC logoIn a no-action letter dated August 6, 2015 entitled Citizen VC, Inc., the SEC has provided important guidance on the procedures needed for an online funding platform to establish the kind of preexisting relationship needed to avoid being deemed to be engaged in general solicitation. As an aside, the concern over general solicitation and preexisting relationships is relevant to offerings under new Rule 506(b), but not under Rule 506(c).   Despite the creation in 2013 of an exemption under new Rule 506(c) pursuant to the JOBS Act for general solicitation offerings in which sales are made only to accredited investors, most online funding platforms continue to prefer to conduct portfolio company offerings indirectly through SPVs under Rule 506(b), despite the prohibition on general solicitation, primarily because of the additional requirement under Rule 506(c) that issuers use reasonable methods to verify accredited investor status.

In its request for a no-action letter, Citizen VC described itself as an citizen vconline venture capital firm that facilitates indirect investment in portfolio companies (through SPVs) by pre-qualified, accredited and sophisticated “members” in its site. It asserted to have qualification procedures intended to establish substantive relationships with, and to confirm the suitability of, prospective investors that visit the website. Anyone wishing to investigate the password protected sections of the site accessible only to members must first register and be accepted for membership. To apply for membership, prospective investors are required to complete an “accredited investor” questionnaire, followed by a relationship building process in which Citizen VC collects information to evaluate the prospective investor’s sophistication, financial circumstances and ability to understand the nature and risks related to an investment. It does so by contacting the prospective investor by phone to discuss the prospective investor’s investing experience and sophistication, investment goals and strategies, financial suitability, risk awareness, and other topics designed to assist Citizen VC in understanding the investor’s sophistication, utilizing third party credit reporting services to gather additional financial information and credit history information and other methods to foster online and offline interactions with the prospective investor. In the request letter, Citizen VC asserted that the relationship establishment period is not limited by a specific time period, but rather is a process based on specific written policies and procedures created to ensure that the offering is suitable for each prospective investor.

Citizen VC stated in its request letter that prospective investors only become “members” and are given access to offering information in the password protected section of the site after Citizen VC is satisfied that the prospective investor has sufficient knowledge and experience and that it has taken reasonable steps necessary to create a substantive relationship with the prospective investor. Once a sufficient number of qualified members have expressed interest in a particular portfolio company, those members are provided subscription materials for investment in the SPV formed by Citizen VC to aggregate such members’ investments, the sale of interests of such SPV is consummated and the SPV then invests the funds, and becomes a shareholder of, the portfolio company.

In its request letter, after providing the foregoing background, Citizen VC asked the SEC staff to opine that the policies and procedures described in the letter are sufficient to create a substantive, pre-existing relationship with prospective investors such that the offering and sale on the site of interests in an SPV that will invest in a particular portfolio company will not constitute general solicitation.

sec no-actionIn its no-action letter, the SEC staff concluded that Citizen VC’s procedures were sufficient to establish a preexisting relationship and do not constitute general solicitation. It stated that the quality of the relationship between an issuer and an investor is the most important factor in determining whether a “substantive” relationship exists and noted Citizen VC’s representation that its policies and procedures are designed to evaluate the prospective investor’s sophistication, financial circumstances and ability to understand the nature and risks of the securities to be offered. The staff went on to say that there is no specific duration of time or particular short form accreditation questionnaire that can be relied upon solely to create such a relationship, and that whether an issuer has sufficient information to evaluate a prospective offeree’s financial circumstances and sophistication will depend on the facts and circumstances of each case. The staff also based its conclusion on Citizen VC’s representation that an investment opportunity is only presented after the prospective investor becomes a “member” in the site.

An argument could be made that SPV-based online funding platforms represent the future of VC investing. The Citizen VC no-action letter provides valuable guidance relating to the establishment of the kind of substantive relationship with prospective investors needed to enable the online funding platform to conduct Rule 506(b) offerings without being deemed to engage in general solicitation.

Lately I’ve been approached by current and prospective clients about ourcrowdonline funding platforms, either by folks interested in forming and operating them or those interested in raising capital through them. There seems to be a lot of confusion surrounding how they work and what the legal issues are, so here’s my attempt to bring some clarity to this topic.

Quite simply, an online funding platform is any website that seeks to fundableconnect issuers seeking capital with investors willing to invest. Historically, the prohibition on general solicitation in private offerings meant as a practical matter that an issuer was limited to raising capital only from those with whom it had a preexisting relationship. In fact, the prohibition on general solicitation was considered by many to be the most significant obstacle to private capital formation. It’s for this reason that many private issuers seek the services of a placement agent, on whose preexisting relationships an issuer could piggyback. But securing the services of a decent placement agent by a startup looking to make a small offering (e.g., less than $1 million) could be daunting. Commonly referred to as crowdfunding, the phenomenon of online funding platforms is essentially the internet coming to the capital raising industry, which has the potential to transform it the same way the internet disrupted the publishing, retail and transportation industries.

pitchbookOnline funding platforms also have the potential to address another related problem. If you’re a startup located outside of the three major venture hubs – Bay Area, New York Metro and Boston – your chances of raising capital are even slimmer. According to PitchBook’s analysis of second quarter 2015 venture capital activity by region, those three regions accounted for nearly half of total global venture capital invested. Funding platforms have the potential to reach neglected regions of the world.

So, if you’re looking to create and operate an online funding platform, there are two legal issues to be concerned about: the prohibition on general solicitation, and broker dealer regulation.

General Solicitation

The earliest online funding platforms were launched in the ‘90s long before the JOBS Act created an exemption for private offerings using general solicitation. So from their inception, funding platforms sought to avoid engaging in any act that could be construed to fall within the prohibition. And even to this day, nearly two years after the accredited investor only exemption under Rule 506(c) which allows general solicitation, most funding platforms still rely on the old exemption under Rule 506(b) which prohibits it.

So how does one use the internet to conduct an offering without engaging in a general solicitation? The answer lies in the concept of the preexisting relationship, which a platform may establish under the right circumstances through a process of pre-screening, password protection and cooling off. The practice was blessed by the SEC in its 1998 Lamp Technologies no-action letter, in which the SEC staff found that the pre-qualification of accredited investors and posting of a notice concerning a private fund on a website administered by Lamp Technologies, Inc. (“LTI”) that is password-protected and accessible only to pre-screened accredited investor subscribers would not involve general solicitation. Subscribers who pre-qualified as accredited investors and paid a subscription fee would receive a password granting them access to the site, and subscribers were then subject to a 30-day cooling off period during which they could not invest. The SEC staff noted that (i) both the invitation to complete the questionnaire and the questionnaire itself would be generic in nature and would not reference any of the investment opportunities on the site, (ii) the password-protected site would be accessible to an investor only after LTI confirmed accredited investor status, and (iii) a potential investor could purchase securities only after the 30-day cooling-off period.

Broker-Dealer Regulation

Funding portals must choose between two alternative but mutually exclusive business models: broker-dealer and venture fund. In the former, investors purchase the securities of, and invest directly in, the operating company; in the latter, the platform organizers form a special purpose vehicle (“SPV”), investors buy shares in the SPV and the operating company closes the round with only one investor (the SPV). Among other things, the choice of business model has enormous consequences for the operating company’s cap table.

Many sponsors of funding platforms structure themselves so as to not be deemed to be a “broker-dealer”, which would mean having to register with the SEC as a broker-dealer and be subject to reporting, disclosure and other burdensome regulations.

Under Section 3(a)(4) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, a “broker” is defined as any person that is “engaged in the business of effecting transactions in securities for the account of others.” According to the SEC, a person “effects transactions in securities” if he participates in such transactions “at key points in the chain of distribution”, and that a person is “engaged in the business” if he receives transaction-related compensation and holds himself out as a broker. The determination as to whether an entity is acting as a “broker” requires a facts and circumstances analysis, but the SEC attributes great weight to whether transaction-based compensation is paid.

Some funding platforms are operated by registered broker-dealers, or are owned, operated by or partnered with registered broker-dealers. These platforms facilitate sales of the operating company’s securities directly to accredited investors. The broker-dealer model platforms receive transaction-based compensation, typically consisting of a percentage of the funds raised, generally ranging from one to ten percent, depending on the offering amount and type of deal.

Other funding platform operators avoid broker-dealer regulation like the plague. Before the JOBS Act, the SEC provided some guidance in the form of no-action letters that conditioned relief from broker-dealer regulation on the platform not providing investment advice, receiving transaction-based compensation, participating in negotiations or holding investor funds. Section 201 of the JOBS Act provides an explicit broker-dealer exemption for online platforms to broker capital raising transactions under Rule 506 (even with general solicitation), provide ancillary services other than investment advice and provide standardized deal documents so long as the platform does not receive transaction-based compensation or handle customer funds or securities and is not a “bad actor.”

In 2013, the SEC gave further guidance to investment fund model platforms in the form of two no-action letters, FundersClub and AngelsList.

FundersClub sources start-ups for its affiliated funds or SPVs to invest in and fundersclubthen posts information on its website that is only available to FundersClub members, all of whom are accredited investors. The SPV relies on Rule 506 to conduct an offering in the SPV. FundersClub negotiates the terms of the SPV’s investment in the start-up. FundersClub does not receive any transaction-based compensation other than administrative fees; instead, it receives a carry of 20% or less of the profits of the SPV but never exceeding 30%. In stating that it would not recommend enforcement action under Section 15(a)(1) of the Exchange Act, the Staff noted that FundersClub’s activities appear to comply with Section 201 of the JOBS Act, in part because it receives no compensation in connection with the purchase or sale of securities.

In AngelList, the SEC staff noted AngelList’s platform must be “exclusively available” to accredited investors and that AngelList may not receive any transaction-based compensation or solicit investors outside of the website itself. In AngelList, a “lead angel” would source the start-ups and structure terms in exchange for a back-end carried interest that would be shared between an AngelList-affiliated investment adviser and the lead angel. The significance of this letter appears to be in not treating back-end carried interest as transaction-based compensation.

The SEC yesterday issued its highly anticipated final rules amending Regulation A to allow issuers u-s-secto raise up to $50 million in any 12 month period through public offering techniques but without registration with the SEC or state blue sky authorities.  The 453 page rules release features a scaled disclosure regime to provide issuers with increased flexibility with regard to offering size and should lower the burden of fixed costs associated with conducting Reg A offerings as a percentage of proceeds. The new rules go into effect 60 days after they are published in the Federal Register.

Reg A has been one of the most rarely used exemptions for securities offerings because it’s been perceived as cost ineffective: the $5 million maximum is just not worth the burdens associated with blue sky registration and qualification requirements in each state where the securities are offered.  JOBS act 2Fixed costs such as legal and accounting fees have served as a disincentive to use the exemption for lower offering amounts. Congress addressed the problem in 2012 through Title IV of the JOBS Act, which required the SEC to amend Reg A by exempting from Securities Act registration certain securities offerings of up to $50 million in any 12 month period. The anticipated amendment to Reg A has been referred to affectionately by securities lawyers as Reg A+, since it’s intended to be a more useful version of the old Reg A.

Old Reg A

Old Reg A provides an exemption from Securities Act registration for offerings of up to $5 million in any 12-month period, including no more than $1.5 million in resales by selling stockholders.  Reg A transactions have been referred to as mini public offerings because they permit general solicitation and advertising (prohibited in private offerings other than accredited investor-only offerings under Rule 506(c) passed in September 2013) and require a mini-registration statement to be filed and reviewed by the SEC containing the offering statement to be delivered to offerees.  Most importantly, shares sold in old Reg A offerings are not “covered securities” under the National Securities Markets Improvement Act, meaning that issuers  must comply with the registration and qualification requirements of the blue sky laws of each state where the offering is made.  A Reg A issuer was allowed to “test the waters,” or communicate with potential investors to see if they might be interested in the offering, before it made the filing with the SEC (Form 1-A).  Finally, securities sold in Reg A offerings are not restricted securities, meaning they can be freely resold by non-affiliates of the issuer.

New Reg A

The final rules expand Reg A into two tiers: Tier 1 for securities offerings of up to $20 million; and Tier 2 for offerings of up to $50 million.  The new rules preserve, with some modifications, existing provisions regarding issuer eligibility, offering circular content, testing the waters and “bad actor” disqualification.  Tier 2 issuers are required to include audited financial statements in their offering documents and to file annual, semiannual, and current reports with the SEC.  Except when buying securities listed on a national securities exchange, purchasers in Tier 2 offerings must either be accredited investors or be subject to certain limitations on their investment.

The key provisions of the final rules are as follows:

Offering Limitations and Secondary Sales

The final rules establish two tiers of offerings:

  • Tier 1: annual offering limit of $20 million, including no more than $6 million on behalf of selling stockholders that are affiliates of the issuer.
  • Tier 2: annual offering limit of $50 million, including no more than $15 million on behalf of selling stockholders that are affiliates of the issuer.

Investment Limitation

The SEC’s objective with the tiered approach is to scale regulatory requirements based on offering size, to give issuers more flexibility in raising capital under Reg A and to provide appropriately tailored protections for investors in each tier. The rules impose additional disclosure requirements and investor protection provisions in Tier 2 offerings. Issuers seeking a smaller amount of capital (i.e., no more than $20 million) benefit from scaled disclosure. Although Tier 2 offerings will require enhanced disclosure, it’s possible that the reduction in information assymetry will lead to higher valuations. Thankfully, the final rules raised the Tier 1 offering cap to $20 million from the proposed $5 million. The increase in maximum offering size could also contribute to the development of intermediation services, such as market making, as well as analyst coverage, which could have a positive impact on investor participation and aftermarket liquidity of Reg A shares.

In addition, selling stockholders are limited to no more than 30% of the aggregate offering price in an issuer’s initial Reg A offering and any subsequently qualified Reg A offering within the first 12-month period following the date of qualification of the initial Reg A offering.

As mentioned above, the new rules contain certain investor protections in Tier 2 offerings. The proposed rules included a 10% investment limit for all investors in Tier 2 offerings.  The final rules limit non-accredited investors in Tier 2 offerings to purchases of no more than 10% of the greater of annual income or net worth (for natural persons) or the greater of annual revenue or net assets (for non-natural persons), as proposed.  In response to commentator concerns, the Tier 2 investment limit does not apply to accredited investors or to securities that will be listed on a national securities exchange.  This is a sensible approach, inasmuch as accredited investors, due to their level of income or net worth, are more likely to be able to withstand losses from undiversified exposure to an individual offering, and there’s a higher level of investor protection with issuers required to meet the listing standards of a national securities exchange and become subject to ongoing Exchange Act reporting.

Treatment under Section 12(g)

Section 12(g) of the Exchange Act requires that an issuer with total assets exceeding $10 million and a class of equity securities held of record by either 2,000 persons, or 500 persons who are not accredited investors, register such class of securities with the SEC. In its proposal release, the SEC did not propose to exempt Reg A securities from mandatory registration under Section 12(g), but solicited comment on the issue.  Some commentators questioned the extent to which Reg A securities would be held in street name through brokers, which the proposal mentioned as a factor that could potentially limit the impact of not proposing an exemption from Section 12(g).

The final rules conditionally exempt Tier 2 securities from the provisions of Section 12(g) provided the issuer (i) remains subject to, and is current in (as of fiscal year end), its Reg A periodic reporting obligations, (ii) engages the services of a transfer agent registered with the SEC under the Exchange Act, and (iii) meets requirements similar to those for “smaller reporting companies” (public float of less than $75 million or, in the absence of a public float, annual revenues of less than $50 million).  The transfer agent condition will provide added comfort that stockholder records and secondary trades will be handled accurately.

Offering Statement

The final rules require issuers to file offering statements with the SEC electronically on EDGAR, but permit non-public submission of offering statements and amendments for review by SEC staff before filing so long as all such documents are publicly filed not later than 21 days before qualification.  The new rules eliminate the Model A (Question-and-Answer) disclosure format under Part II of Form 1-A.

Testing the Waters

The new rules permit issuers to “test the waters” with, or solicit interest in a potential offering testing the watersfrom, the general public either before or after the filing of the offering statement, so long as any solicitation materials used after publicly filing the offering statement are preceded or accompanied by a preliminary offering circular or contain a notice informing potential investors where and how the most current preliminary offering circular can be obtained. Solicitation materials remain subject to the antifraud and other civil liability provisions of the federal securities laws.

Continuing Disclosure Obligations

Reg A currently requires issuers to file a Form 2-A with the SEC to report sales and the termination of sales made under Reg A every six months after qualification and within 30 calendar days after the termination, completion or final sale of securities in the offering. The final rules eliminate Form 2-A.  In its place, the rules require Tier 1 issuers to provide information about sales in such offerings and to update certain issuer information by electronically filing a Form 1-Z exit report with the SEC not later than 30 calendar days after termination or completion of an offering.  The rules require Tier 2 issuers to file electronically with the SEC on EDGAR annual and semiannual reports, as well as current event reports.

Application of Blue Sky Laws

The final rules preempt state registration and qualification requirements for Tier 2 offerings but preserve these requirements for Tier 1 offerings, consistent with state registration of Reg A offerings of up to $5 million under existing rules.  The SEC had originally proposed to preempt state regulation with respect to (i) all offerees in Reg A offerings and (ii) all purchasers in Tier 2 offerings.  The proposal to preempt blue sky requirements with respect to all offerees in a Reg A offering was intended to allow issuers relying on Reg A to communicate with potential investors via the internet and social media without concern that these communications might trigger registration requirements under state law.

The issue of state law preemption generated a great deal of public commentary.  To address commenter concerns and avoid potential confusion about the application of the preemption provisions in Tier 1 offerings, the final definition of “qualified purchaser” does not include offerees in Tier 1 offerings.  This is unfortunate.  In order to create an attractive alternative to IPOs, Congress mandated preemption for “qualified purchasers”, which it defined as any purchaser in a (new) Reg A offering. As made clear in the 2012 General Accounting Office Report, a primary reason Reg A has been seldom used is the delay, cost and uncertainty of divergent state review of offerings. Perhaps the SEC should have preempted state regulation of Reg A resales as well. One of the greatest benefits of a Reg A offering versus a Rule 506 offering is that the securities sold in the former will be freely tradeable immediately upon closing of the offering. Without clear federal preemption of blue-sky laws governing the resale of Reg A shares, however, investors may be concerned about their ability to resell their shares which will reduce their willingness to purchase these shares in the first place.

On December 15, 2014, the North American Securities Administrators Association launched the Electronic Filing Depository (“EFD”), an internet accessible database that allows issuers to submit Form D for Rule 506 offerings under Regulation D and pay related fees to state securities regulators.  It also allows anyone to search EFD’s Form D database.

This is a big deal.  Rule 506 of Regulation D is a “safe harbor” for the private offering exemption under Section 4(a)(2) of the Securities Act. Issuers relying on the Rule 506 exemption do not have to register their offering of securities with the SEC or state securities regulators, but they must file a Notice of Exempt Offering of Securities on Form D with the SEC and state securities regulators after they first sell their securities. The National Securities Markets Improvement Act of 1996 (“NSMIA”) was enacted to preempt state securities laws where they duplicate federal laws. As a result of NSMIA, states may not require registration under their blue sky laws of “covered securities”, which includes securities sold under Rule 506 of Regulation D, but are allowed to require issuers to make notice filings and pay filing fees when conducting offers and sales of covered securities in their state.  Most states only require that Rule 506 issuers file a copy of the Form D and pay a filing fee, but there are subtle substantive and mechanical differences among the states that make the process of complying with the blue sky requirements in multistate offerings enormously tedious and burdensome.

The launch of EFD will help alleviate these burdens.  EFD will reduce the time needed to prepare individual state paper filings as well as provide additional benefits such as a means of following the status of a state’s processing of a filing and a digitized depository of filings for public review.

Although state participation is voluntary, 38 states have already opted in.  Characteristically, New York is one of those not to have done so, which is unfortunate because New York’s filing requirements are arguably the most cumbersome, with the requirement to send blue sky filings to three different addresses in the state. 

So far, EFD only covers Form D filings and fee payment; it is not yet designed to handle any other blue sky filings required by participating states.

The NASAA hosts free training webinars on the use of EFD.  The next webinar is scheduled for February 5, 2015, with another webinar tentatively scheduled for February 23, 2015.  You can register here for the webinars.

Last month, the SEC released its Final Report on the 2012 SEC Government-Business Forum on Small Business Capital Formation, the SEC’s annual forum to address perceived unnecessary impediments to small business capital formation. Participants typically include small business executives, VCs, government officials, trade association representatives, lawyers, accountants, academics and small business advocates.  The Report contains a prioritized list of 35 recommendations collectively made by the Forum’s participants (not necessarily endorsed by the SEC), many of which were addressed to the SEC’s JOBS Act rulemaking efforts .

Receiving the most attention by far was equity crowdfunding, which was the subject of 11 separate recommendations including the six with the highest priority.  Other areas of concern in order of priority included the elimination of the prohibition on general solicitation and advertising from “accredited investor only” Rule 506 sales, definition of “accredited investor”, small public offerings under so-called “Regulation A+”, “bad boy” disqualifications from Reg D offerings, and “micro-offering” exemption for non-reporting companies.

Here are some of the highlights of the Report’s recommendations:

  •  Crowdfunding:  Simplify disclosure rules, taking into account size and stage of development of the issuer (including whether the issuer is a start-up); flexibility on financial statement rules, including raising the trigger for audited financials; permitting concurrent offerings on same terms to accredited investors (with no investment limit) in excess of the $1 million limit; investor self-certification of investment limits; and safe harbors for platforms and other crowdfunding players.

 

  • Accredited Investor-Only Private Offerings:  Safe harbors, including presumption of accreditation if investor meets SEC established minimum investment threshold; sliding scale of steps to verify accreditation based on facts and circumstances surrounding offering, e.g., issuer’s familiarity and pre-existing relationship with the potential investor.

 

  • Definition of “Accredited Investor”: Retain current income and net worth levels in definition of “accredited investor”.

 

  • Reg A+ Small Offerings: Make a Reg A+ filed security a “covered security” (i.e., state registration requirements do not apply); and scaled disclosure.

 

  • “Bad boy” disqualifications from Reg D offerings: Target true bad actors without imposing a disqualification so broad as to affect persons who may not be true bad actors.

 

  • “Micro-offering” exemption:  Adopt true “micro-offering” exemption for non-reporting companies with only minimal conditions (e.g., “friends and family” offerings well below $1 million crowdfunding threshold).

 

  • Smaller Reporting Companies:  Increase maximum amount of public float in the definition of “smaller reporting company” from $75 million to $250 million.

 

  • Auditor Attestation Exemption:   Expand SOX 404(b) exemption to companies with less than $250 million of public float and possibly up to $500 million of public float.