🌟 Editor's Note
Hello Beehiiv world, and I’m happy to be here!
🤔”What are we even talking about?”
📌 Investment crowdfunding, also known as equity crowdfunding or crowdinvesting, is a method of raising capital for businesses or projects by soliciting numerous individuals to invest relatively small amounts through online platforms.
📌 Unlike traditional crowdfunding, where backers might receive a product or other non-monetary rewards, investment crowdfunding offers backers equity shares in the company or other forms of investment instruments like debt or real estate.
📌 In essence, it democratizes the investment process, allowing a broader range of investors, not just accredited ones, to participate in funding early-stage companies and projects.
🤔”Why should I care?”
Regulation Crowdfunding (or RegCF) enables early stage pre-ipo American startups and scaleups to raise money from “the crowd” (retail and institutional), and for investors to finally get exposure to this asset class without having to be rich (aka accredited) first.
In my book, it’s the single most exciting undiscovered wealth building opportunity, with an industry I see exploding from the current $3B to $15B+ during the current administration, and to $50B+ by 2035! (10x vs. 2x - see below, and play around!)
Investment Crowdfunding Industry Growth: Interactive Comparison
🤯…There are only 3 ways to make money in this business …
😉I’m not first, and I don’t cheat - but I definitely can help you get smarter!
🤘”Why me, and why now?”
Been there, done that, that’s why I know where this is going, as I’ve seen this movie before.
These are some of the key drivers that will support my narrative:
It’s a copy/paste with what happened with p2p lending 15 years ago (sign up and you’ll get my story in a future letter)
Communitization of everything, away from big corporates towards ‘the crowd’
Blockchain and tokenization of anything is changing everything
These and more drivers will be addressed in future editions, but that’s it for now.
👉 Resources
I do want to draw your attention to 2 books that were recently published, both by close friends of mine, and a good start c.q. required reading if you want to know where we are (Sherwood) and where we’re going (Doug) with the industry👇
🚀 My mantra
“If just 1% of Americans invest just $1,000 per annum for the next 4 years (the current administration), we can take this industry (RegCF) from the current $2.8B to $16B+, and scale it to beyond $50B+ by 2035.” (re. chart supra)👆
Liquidity attracts liquidity. It happened with consumer lending in the 2010’s (early form of debt crowdfunding). It happened with bitcoin. It will happen with investment crowdfunding.
🦄 Startup Spotlight (a current RegCF offering)
Cairnspring Mills: American-grown premium flour bursting with flavor — and demand
[#1 on CClear’s Capital Pulse Ratings List this week]
Cairnspring Mills is a Burlington, WA–based craft-flour producer founded in 2016 that stone-mills identity-preserved, regeneratively grown grains.
2024 revenue reached ≈ $6.2 million on 41 % gross margin with 6.8 million lbs milled, and the company is raising a priced Reg CF round on Wefunder at a $21.15 million pre-money valuation to finance a second “Blue Mountain” mill in Oregon.
The expansion is projected (management estimate) to lift sales toward $48.8 million by 2028 and ultimately $118 million by 2033.
Did You Know? Ever wonder what lit the fuse for modern equity crowdfunding? A single U.S. law—the 2012 JOBS Act—legalized public online solicitation for private shares, creating today’s $3 billion-plus Reg CF market.
Till next time,