Hidden Valuation Is a Red Flag for Crowdfund Investors
This was originally posted at Superpowers for Good.
Teddy Lyons at Kingscrowd has done the investment crowdfunding community a real service with his analysis, “Who’s Hiding the Valuation? A Crowdfunding Transparency Study.” In the piece, Teddy and the Kingscrowd team reviewed 880 equity crowdfunding offerings and documented a troubling transparency gap, especially among Reg A+ offerings.
Since I read Teddy’s post when it was published weeks ago, I’ve reflected on this over and over. It is so important that I decided I need to bubble it back to the top of the conversation in the regulated investment crowdfunding community.
Teddy frames the issue well. “What is a startup actually worth?” he asks. That is the question every investor must answer before making an equity investment. Whether the security is common stock, preferred stock, a SAFE or a convertible note, valuation—or the mechanism for determining valuation—is central to the investor’s prospects for a financial return.
Other de...more
What Makes a Company a Good Candidate for Crowdfunding?
Crowdfund Holdings Innovators (CHI)
Not every company that needs capital is a good candidate for crowdfunding.
That is the first thing founders and executives should understand. Crowdfunding is not simply a financing transaction moved online. It is a public capital-raising campaign that requires a company to explain its business clearly, activate an audience, support investor diligence, comply with securities rules, and market the offering over a period of weeks or months.
The best candidates are not merely companies that want money. They are companies with leadership teams that can turn a financing need into a credible public campaign.
A strong crowdfunding candidate usually has five things: a clear story, a reachable audience or serious marketing plan, a concrete reason to raise now, the budget to run the campaign properly, and the discipline to manage ongoing compliance after the raise.
A clear and compelling story
A company does not need to be simple, but its public-facing story does need to be understandable.
Prospe...more
Progress happens when collaboration meets purpose
Crowdfunding Professional Association (CfPA)
Advancing the future of private capital formation.
The CfPA SEC Subcommittee engages directly with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on policy alignment, industry compliance, exempt offerings, and the evolving regulatory landscape surrounding crypto and digital assets.
By bringing industry voices to the table, CfPA continues to advocate for balanced regulation, market integrity, innovation, and expanded opportunities for investors and issuers alike.
Progress happens when collaboration meets purpose.
Join the CfPA as a member today and lend your voice to any number of the CfPA Committees or Subcommittees working to make a difference in the Regulated Investment Crowdfunding industry.
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Profitable Impact Investing Requires Due Diligence—But How Much Can You Afford Before Investing $100?
This article first appeared in Superpowers for Good.
Angel investors have long understood something ordinary investors are now learning: due diligence matters.
A well-known study of angel investors found that investors who spent more time on due diligence tended to earn better returns. The Angel Capital Education Foundation study, led by Robert Wiltbank and Warren Boeker, reviewed more than 1,100 angel investment exits and found that due diligence time, relevant experience and ongoing participation were all associated with stronger outcomes.
That makes intuitive sense.
If you are investing $100,000 in a startup, spending 40 hours studying the company, the market, the management team, the terms and the risks may not only be reasonable but essential.
If you are investing $25,000, the same may still be true.
But what if you are investing $1,000?
What if you are investing $100?
That is the practical challenge facing everyday investors who want to participate in Regulation Crowdfunding.
We ...more
Impact Investors Deserve Fair Terms
This post was originally published at Superpowers for Good.
Everyday investors who want to invest for impact run a real risk: we may accept more financial risk, or lower potential returns, than we can afford simply because we care about the mission.
There are times when I absolutely support that kind of philanthropic approach.
I make Kiva loans every month. I do that knowing I won’t earn a financial return. In fact, after defaults and currency losses, I expect to get back a little less than I put in. I’m comfortable with that because I value the impact. In my mind, those are philanthropic investments.
But most of our money can’t be treated that way.
For ordinary investors—people saving for retirement, college, a home purchase, a rainy day or simply a more secure future—most investments need to be priced to produce a reasonable return for the risk involved.
That is especially true in regulated investment crowdfunding.
Reg CF offerings are risky. Startups fail. Small busin...more
One Year After the SEC Capital Markets Subcommittee Hearing: Investor Protection Is Still the Missing Piece
A little over a year ago I sat through the SEC Capital Markets Subcommittee hearing on Regulation Crowdfunding (Reg CF) and Regulation A+. I walked away with mixed feelings. The advocates pushing to expand these pathways for capital formation got me fired up, especially for what it means for small businesses and everyday investors. But I was also frustrated that comprehensive risk mitigation and investor protection barely came up.
Twelve months later, not much has changed on that front. The advocacy for expanding Reg CF and Reg A+ has only gotten louder, and rightly so. But the conversation around protecting the unaccredited investors these frameworks are designed to welcome still hasn't caught up. So I want to take another swing at why that matters, and why TigerMark D&O exists to fill exactly that gap.
A quick note on what's changed on my end. TigerMark now sits under Equal Parts Insurance, the AI-native brokerage and MGA I joined when Assurely was acquired in 2025. The product i...more
The First 10 Days Decide the Ceiling of Your Raise
About half of all Reg CF campaigns raise roughly $115,000. That number barely covers a month of burn for most startups. Meanwhile, the top 10% of issuers pull in the vast majority of investment dollars. The difference between those two outcomes usually becomes visible within the first 10 days of going live.
I've overseen hundreds of crowdfunding campaigns at Digital Niche Agency, and one pattern keeps proving itself: early performance doesn't merely signal trajectory… it actively constrains what a campaign can achieve from that point forward. A slow start creates a ceiling that's incredibly difficult to break through, no matter how much effort you throw at it later.
Think of it like an empty restaurant. The place might have beautiful interior design, a well-crafted menu, and great lighting, but if nobody is sitting at the tables, something feels off. Prospective diners walk by and keep going. The same psychology applies to crowdfunding. An investor lands on your offering page, sees $10...more
Are Your Reg CF Issuers Falling Behind on Annual Reporting? Here's How to Check for Free.
Regulation Crowdfunding has quietly created a compliance problem that most of the ecosystem isn't talking about.
Since Reg CF went live in 2016, over 8,800 companies have raised money through equity crowdfunding - nearly 70% of them have surpassed their minimum funding target. Many — issuers, portals, CPAs, and attorneys alike — don't realize that a successful raise doesn't end the compliance clock. It starts it.
What the Law Actually Requires
Under Rule 202 of Regulation Crowdfunding (17 CFR §227.202), every issuer that completes a Reg CF offering must file an annual report on Form C-AR within 120 days of its fiscal year end — typically April 30 for calendar-year companies. This obligation continues every year until the issuer:
- Files a Form C-TR to formally terminate its reporting obligations
- Becomes an SEC reporting company
- Has fewer than 300 holders of record and has filed at least one annual report
- Has repurchased all securities sold in the offering
This isn't optional guidance....more
