Category: Speaking Engagements

Making Intrastate Crowdfunding Regulations Work For State Regulators

On By crowdfundattnyIn Speaking Engagements, UncategorizedLeave a comment

I have been asked by Disrupt Radio to be a special guest on their Disruptive View program highlighting Intrastate Crowdfunding and how to make it work for state regulators.

Join us tomorrow, November 4, 2014 at 12:30 pm EST! To tune in, click here.

Disrupt Radio an online news source that delivers weekly articles covering the latest disruptive business, technology, equity investing and economic news for innovative entrepreneurs, business leaders, tech savvy women, and curious consumers who want the hottest trends, tips and real help from successful celebrity entrepreneurs, provocative thought-leaders and forward-thinking executives from around the globe.

To view the press release in its entirety, click here.

Questions? Let me know.

Crowdfunding At NAIOP Conference In Denver

On By crowdfundattnyIn Crowdfunding, Crowdfunding Speaking Engagements, Speaking EngagementsLeave a comment

Denver Rocky Mtns

NAIOP,  the largest commercial real estate organization in the country (the world?), held its Development ’14 conference in Denver this week. I had the pleasure of moderating a Crowdfunding panel that included Darren Powderly, the Founder of CrowdStreet, and Adam Hooper, the founder of RealCrowd.

A few observations:

—  Institutional money is flooding the U.S. real estate market, especially the primary U.S. markets. One foreign investor, the Norwegian sovereign wealth fund, has about $1.2 trillion of capital (North Sea oil) and is committed to investing $9 billion per year into real estate assets. This is both an opportunity and a challenge for real estate Crowdfunding: an opportunity because of the capital; but also a challenge because capital is already so readily available.

—  Good real estate deals are in short supply. Fund managers were scouring the conference floor for opportunities like kids in an Easter egg hunt.

—  Crowdfunding remains a small blip on the radar screen. Many attendees I spoke with hadn’t heard the term. Our panel attracted an audience of about 30, while a panel on Logistics and another on Alternative Financing each attracted at least 200.

—  Yet our audience was, by far, the most curious and enthusiastic I saw. When we had to stop, 10 minutes past our allotted time, there were still half a dozen raised hands.

—  The conference was about real estate deals – finding them, developing them, financing them. And not just any deals, but the best institutional-quality real estate deals in the world. Yet because those deals are reserved for institutions, very few of the hundreds of attendees who spent three days talking about deals can invest in the deals. How long can that last in an Internet-empowered world?

It was a great conference and I want to thank NAIOP for inviting me to attend. The potential for Crowdfunding is enormous. Next year, I bet we get 100.

Questions? Let me know.

Crowdfunding Meets P2P Lending in San Francisco

On By crowdfundattnyIn Crowdfunding, Crowdfunding Speaking Engagements, JOBS Act, P2P Lending, Speaking EngagementsLeave a comment

Golden Gate_purchased

For me, the CFGE Crowdfund Banking and Lending Summit in San Francisco was both eye-opening and provocative.

Andrea Downs and her team assembled a terrific group of speakers, including:

  • Richard Swart of Berkeley, who described the past, present, and future of equity Crowdfunding around the world with his normal clarity and depth of data.
  • Ron Suber of Prosper, who demonstrated in 45 minutes how he’s brought Prosper back from a near-death experience to create a $1+ billion business.
  • Nikul Patel of Lending Tree, who described the business model behind P2P lending better than I’ve ever heard it described.
  • John Berlau of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, who put modern Crowdfunding into a historical framework reaching back to Henry Ford and beyond, asking “Why doesn’t government just get the hell out of the way?”

To say I was honored to be among that group of speakers is an understatement.

I spend a lot of time thinking where equity Crowdfunding is headed. You couldn’t sit through this conference without wondering where equity Crowdfunding and P2P lending are going to intersect. We’ll explore that further in future posts, maybe even get some experts to chime in, but if you’re a Title II portal it sure does seem there are lessons in the P2P model.

I was thinking about that in a bar on Thursday evening when Travis Ishikawa crushed a three run shot to send the Giants to the World Series, and again on Saturday, while I pedaled a bicycle in blazing sunlight across the Golden Gate bridge and through Sausalito, Mill Valley, and Tiburon. There are worse places to think.

Thanks to Andrea Downs and her CFGE team for a great event.

Questions? Let me know.

Austin Roundup

On By crowdfundattnyIn Crowdfunding Real Estate, Crowdfunding Speaking Engagements, JOBS Act, Speaking Engagements, Title II, Title II Crowdfunding, Title III Crowdfunding, UncategorizedLeave a comment

Austin cityscapeHats off to the folks at Coastal Shows for making the Austin event – officially the CFGE Crowdfund Real Estate Summit – the best Crowdfunding event ever.

The event featured the leading players in the industry:

Title III of the JOBS Act may be flawed, and the final rules for Regulation A+ may be long overdue, but the speakers and panelists agree that Crowdfunding is here to stay, with Title II leading the way. Two days before the conference began, Fundrise raised $31 million of capital in a Series A round of financing. That served as a very useful background, illuminating the potential of a market that promises to transform the U.S. capital formation industry.

Over coffee during the day and beer in the evening, I spoke with dozens of real estate developers and entrepreneurs. Their message came through loud and clear: We’re tired of dealing exclusively with our traditional sources of capital and are eager to raise money through Crowdfunding channels.

Developers are eager for new sources of capital, and individual investors are eager to participate in a market that, until now, has been reserved for institutions and the very wealthy. That’s Crowdfunding, in a nutshell.

What happens in Vegas might stay in Vegas, but what happened in Austin is going to spread across the country. Thanks for a great event, Coastal Shows.

Crowdfunding Through Funding Portals: What You Need To Know

On By crowdfundattnyIn Crowdfunding Portals, Speaking EngagementsLeave a comment

TKCI have been asked by The Knowledge Congress to speak at the Crowdfunding Through Funding Portals: What You Need to Know Live Webcast.

The live webcast will take place on Wednesday, March 19, 2014 from 12:00 – 2:00 PM EST and has been approved for CLE credits. For more information, or to register, click here.

For more information on Crowdfunding, including news, updates and links to important information pertaining to the JOBS Act and how Crowdfunding may affect your business, check back here, or follow me on twitter @CrowdfundAttny.