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> People working in the industry know that you just need a lawyer or CPA to sign off on that. In your experience how willing are CPAs or lawyers to do that for

> People working in the industry know that you just need a lawyer or CPA to sign off on that. In your experience how willing are CPAs or lawyers to do that for you? In theory they're putting their credentials on the line for you, so I imagine it's either hard to find ones that will do that or very expensive to the point where it eats into the investment return with the amounts of capital being invested below the accredited investor limit.

vmception 6y ago
lol maybe 10 years ago and briefly. There have been a SaaS services for this the whole decade, and that’s only because the issuer exemptions were expanded to even need a lawyer because an investor saying “yeah Im accredited” wasn't good enough for some securities issuance exemptions. You don't lie to the lawyer (or most lawyers), you show assets. Assets which so happen to have a value and are totally illiquid. You trade a single unit of something you create for $1 and you happen to have 2,000,000 more units. You’re accredited by any standard. No different than your portfolio of houses in a place nobody wants to live in, which still happen to have appraisals totaling over $1mm. If that doesnt feel “right” to you then you might be confusing who actually has the consequence here and might have been unproductively conditioned to “follow the letter of the law” compared to the consequences and implementation of the law. Again its a prohibition on the securities issuer which they pass on to the investor. Its not a prohibition from the government on the investor or the lawyer. And the securities issuer simply has to go through the motions. Check, check and check. And the investor has to pony up the cash. If they don’t have the $25K or $100K minimum anyway then get out. The government’s role in this is just a redundant deterrent.
- ninetax 6y ago
  I understand who has the consequences here. My curiosity is about that conversation with the lawyer when you say "I traded a single unit of something I created for $1 and I happen to have 2,000,000 more units." where something is cryptocurrency (what else could it be?). Would most lawyers go "Yep, just another routine accredited investor check, $200 please." Or would most say "I'm being asked to affirm this person has $1m in assets and in the off chance that somehow this is checked by someone I could be penalized because I didn't do my diligence to make sure this isn't just funny money".
  - vmception 6y ago
    the latter would only happen if dubious value propositions by poor/middle class people became too commonplace after they started complaining about losing their money and management in private securities offerings. the company will then double down on covering their ass by looking into who is making complaints. if they start predictably acting like non-accredited investors after jumping through those hoops, then there will be more scrutiny. right now not enough people that are actually poor jump through those hoops. there are a lot of people liquid with $25k-$100k or can get it, that don't make $200k/year or have $1mm in assets when not excluding their home. the wealth requirements also don't account for cost of living by area. Some of them jump through the hoops to get access to things they really should have access to. The rest don't and poorer people can't because the investment minimums so that nobody's time is wasted is too high.

vmception 6y ago

lol maybe 10 years ago and briefly. There have been a SaaS services for this the whole decade, and that’s only because the issuer exemptions were expanded to even need a lawyer because an investor saying “yeah Im accredited” wasn't good enough for some securities issuance exemptions. You don't lie to the lawyer (or most lawyers), you show assets. Assets which so happen to have a value and are totally illiquid. You trade a single unit of something you create for $1 and you happen to have 2,000,000 more units. You’re accredited by any standard. No different than your portfolio of houses in a place nobody wants to live in, which still happen to have appraisals totaling over $1mm. If that doesnt feel “right” to you then you might be confusing who actually has the consequence here and might have been unproductively conditioned to “follow the letter of the law” compared to the consequences and implementation of the law. Again its a prohibition on the securities issuer which they pass on to the investor. Its not a prohibition from the government on the investor or the lawyer. And the securities issuer simply has to go through the motions. Check, check and check. And the investor has to pony up the cash. If they don’t have the $25K or $100K minimum anyway then get out. The government’s role in this is just a redundant deterrent.

ninetax 6y ago
I understand who has the consequences here. My curiosity is about that conversation with the lawyer when you say "I traded a single unit of something I created for $1 and I happen to have 2,000,000 more units." where something is cryptocurrency (what else could it be?). Would most lawyers go "Yep, just another routine accredited investor check, $200 please." Or would most say "I'm being asked to affirm this person has $1m in assets and in the off chance that somehow this is checked by someone I could be penalized because I didn't do my diligence to make sure this isn't just funny money".
- vmception 6y ago
  the latter would only happen if dubious value propositions by poor/middle class people became too commonplace after they started complaining about losing their money and management in private securities offerings. the company will then double down on covering their ass by looking into who is making complaints. if they start predictably acting like non-accredited investors after jumping through those hoops, then there will be more scrutiny. right now not enough people that are actually poor jump through those hoops. there are a lot of people liquid with $25k-$100k or can get it, that don't make $200k/year or have $1mm in assets when not excluding their home. the wealth requirements also don't account for cost of living by area. Some of them jump through the hoops to get access to things they really should have access to. The rest don't and poorer people can't because the investment minimums so that nobody's time is wasted is too high.