Q4 2020 set a new industry record for the amount raised via regulation crowdfunding in a single quarter! Companies raised $82.6M in Q4 2020, a substantial increase over figures reported in Q3 ($58.9M) and Q2 ($48.2M). 

Looking at 2020 as a whole, companies have raised a total of $500M via Regulation Crowdfunding to date. At the end of 2019, the total amount of funds raised via Reg CF was $281M, and 2020’s growth represents a 78% increase YoY for the industry.

We are so thrilled to celebrate the industry’s growth in 2020—and to celebrate the growth we’ve seen at StartEngine too. Last year, companies on StartEngine raised $147M, a YoY increase of 236%!

And even more exciting, upcoming regulatory changes have the potential to accelerate that growth, both for StartEngine and the industry as a whole.

Beginning in mid-March 2021, the SEC rule changes will take effect, and these changes will allow companies to raise more (Reg CF’s annual maximum funding goal will increase from $1.07M to $5M), and allow investors to invest more. 

As shown by the recent situation involving Robinhood and GameStop, the power of the retail investor is growing. The general public has demonstrated a growing appetite for investment, and StartEngine, one of the largest companies in equity crowdfunding, is at the center of this shift.

Learn more about the industry’s growth in the Q4 2020 StartEngine Index.

StartEngine was featured on the cover of the latest issue of the LA Business Journal! The LA Business Journal interviewed our Co-Founder & CEO Howard Marks about the beginning of StartEngine and the inspiration behind the company.

Howard spoke of the struggle he saw firsthand when he invested in 60 entrepreneurs between 2010 and 2014, back in the days when StartEngine was a tech accelerator, and how difficult it was for those entrepreneurs to raise funding after they graduated the accelerator program, particularly for the female and minority founders.

“It’s very frustrating to watch a young person with their dream get completely discouraged because no one will invest in their company,” Howard told the LA Business Journal. “Not every company should get investment, but I believe the playing field should be level.”

That is why he founded StartEngine. To level the playing field and give entrepreneurs who may not have access to venture capital and accredited investor networks the opportunity to raise from another source of funding: the crowd. “There are millions of people out there who want to invest. We’ve got to create that marketplace,” Howard said.

Read the article here!

Tomorrow morning at 9am PT, 5 entrepreneurs will pitch their business live to Mr. Wonderful. One company will win a $25K prize, as well as a 1-on-1 meeting with Kevin O'Leary and StartEngine's CEO Howard Marks.

RSVP here to watch StartEngine's second pitch competition tomorrow and see Mr. Wonderful in action. Watch our sizzle reel from our last pitch competition below to get a sense of what's in store:

Our CEO Howard Marks did an interview on Kitco News and discussed the state of the economy today, what the administration change means for the future of entrepreneurship, and how equity crowdfunding fits into a changing investment landscape.

“The pandemic, in many ways, has accelerated the future,” said Howard, as he continues to discuss the massive increase in the number of new business applications in the US in the third quarter this year, according to data from the US Census Bureau.

“I think a lot of people lost their jobs in the beginning in the pandemic. I think there was a trend to lay off a lot of people, especially from big business, and also from small companies like restaurants,” said Howard. “This generated an opportunity for people who are at home to say, ‘should I pursue my dreams today?’”

Watch a recording of the interview here! 

The opinions expressed by Howard in this interview do not reflect opinions held by StartEngine itself, nor should they be considered investment advice.

Yesterday, Monday November 2nd, 2020, the SEC made some key changes to Regulation Crowdfunding that will go into effect soon, and we believe these changes could greatly accelerate StartEngine’s growth! The upcoming changes to Reg CF include:

• Increasing the maximum amount companies can raise from $1.07M to $5M.

• Amending the investment limits for investors by 1) removing investment limits for accredited investors and 2) using the greater of their annual income or net worth when calculating the investment limits for non-accredited investors.

• Extending Reg CF's COVID-relief measures for an additional 18 months.

• Permitting “test-the-waters” communications, which allows issuers to solicit interest from investors prior to filing the offering documents and can help issuers determine which exemption (Regulation Crowdfunding or A+) to use.

• Permitting “demo day” communications that would not be deemed general solicitation or general advertising.

• Permitting Special Purpose Vehicles in Regulation Crowdfunding offerings.

The SEC also increased the maximum amount companies can raise under Regulation A+ from $50M to $75M. With these changes, the SEC has made equity crowdfunding a more compelling option for entrepreneurs by helping entrepreneurs access more funding via Regulation Crowdfunding and Regulation A+.

These changes become official 60 days after publication to the Federal Register, and we are excited to share these updates with our community. This could encourage more companies to raise capital on StartEngine and help those companies raise more funding. As a result, we believe these changes will increase our growth, attract more mature companies to equity crowdfunding, and bring you a greater variety of new and exciting investment opportunities.

Thank you to the SEC for helping StartEngine's mission to help entrepreneurs achieve their dreams!

Our funding round closes in 40 minutes at 1pm PT today, and this is your last opportunity to invest in StartEngine’s current offering. Here are a few more things you should know about us:

• Crowd-Funded: we drink our own Kool-Aid and raise funding from the crowd too. It helps us relate to the companies raising on our platform, and of course, it strengthens our bond with you, our investor community. To date, we’ve raised over $30M from the crowd across three Regulation A+ offerings and numerous Regulation Crowdfunding offerings, and we have over 18,000 shareholders on our cap table.

• Trading: we plan to launch our investor trading marketplace StartEngine Secondary in October, and StartEngine itself will be the first company available to trade. We hope this will give our shareholders an opportunity to access liquidity and trade.

Be a part of our story and join StartEngine’s mission to help other entrepreneurs achieve their dreams. 

What Investors Are Saying About StartEngine

“Great webinar StartEngine just had on next steps from here. It has made me even more pumped to be an investor and the insights Howard and Kevin gave made me see the extraordinary future in store for StartEngine. I imagine that webinar will be posted on the StartEngine YouTube page and I highly recommend anyone who missed it to check it out. Especially if you are still debating on investing because there are only a few hours left to invest in StartEngine and join this amazing journey with the StartEngine team and investors.” - Robert

This investment is speculative, illiquid, and involves a high degree of risk, including the possible loss of your entire investment.

These testimonials may not be representative of the experience of other customers. These testimonials are no guarantee of future performance or success.

The StartEngine secondary market is still currently under development. Furthermore, once development is completed, if a company is qualified to list its securities on the market, there is no guarantee that demand for these securities will exist. Even if a company does meet the requirements for listing its securities, we do not know the extent to which investor interest will lead to the development and maintenance of a liquid trading market. You should assume that you may not be able to liquidate your investments for some time or be able to pledge these shares as collateral, if at all.

Over 650 people RSVP’d to the webinar with our CEO Howard Marks and Mr. Wonderful this morning, and we received so many amazing questions. Thank you to everyone who tuned in!

If you missed it, you can watch a recording of the webinar to listen to Howard’s conversation with Kevin O’Leary. We had to remove the Q&A portion at the end for compliance review, but you can watch the first half of the webinar here:

If you have any final questions, please leave us a comment on our campaign page! We will be answering as many questions as we can until our offering closes at 1pm PT today!

P.S. if you were wondering what the amount “$XXX” in our last update was (sorry, it happens when you publish writing before having coffee), we have raised $4,639,271 in the past 7 days!

This investment is speculative, illiquid, and involves a high degree of risk, including the possible loss of your entire investment.

Kevin O’Leary is a paid spokesperson for StartEngine. Read the 17-B disclosure at https://www.startengine.com/17b

The StartEngine secondary market is still currently under development. Furthermore, once development is completed, if a company is qualified to list its securities on the market, there is no guarantee that demand for these securities will exist. Even if a company does meet the requirements for listing its securities, we do not know the extent to which investor interest will lead to the development and maintenance of a liquid trading market. You should assume that you may not be able to liquidate your investments for some time or be able to pledge these shares as collateral, if at all.

Thank you so much for the support we’ve seen in the final days of our raise. We’ve raised over $XXX in our final week. We’ve received so many words of encouragement in the comments, in email, in phone conversations, and we are grateful to have a community that is so supportive and excited about StartEngine’s mission. We don’t take it for granted.

Our funding round ends today at 1pm PT, and these are your final few hours to invest in this offering!

If you want to hear from our CEO Howard Marks before the close of this raise, don’t forget to RSVP here to our webinar with Mr. Wonderful this morning at 9am PT. The two will have a conversation about our growth to date and what’s in store for our future.

If you’re new to StartEngine, here are some things you should know about us:

• Owner’s Bonus: if you invest $1,000 or more in this offering (or are an existing StartEngine shareholder and make a subsequent investment in StartEngine), you will earn the Owner’s Bonus for one year and get access to 3 great perks: earning 10% bonus shares when investing in participating campaigns, receiving email notifications when new bonus-eligible companies launch and skipping the waitlist on oversubscribed campaigns.

• Investor Base: StartEngine’s user base comprises over 100,000 active investors, nearly half of whom have made more than one investment. In 2019, the number of first-time investors more than doubled from 2018.

What Investors Are Saying About StartEngine

“The success of your company’s concept, continued growth, opportunities for investors and the invested alike, and your overall transparent presentations make it an easy decision to be a part of.” - Sara

“A friend recommended StartEngine to me, and I like the idea of investing in small businesses that are the backbone of our US economy.” - Robert

This investment is speculative, illiquid, and involves a high degree of risk, including the possible loss of your entire investment.

These testimonials may not be representative of the experience of other customers. These testimonials are no guarantee of future performance or success.

Kevin O’Leary is a paid spokesperson for StartEngine. Read the 17-B disclosure at https://www.startengine.com/17b

Our funding round closes in 24 hours! This is your final day to invest in this offering and join 11,420 other investors.

Want to hear StartEngine’s Co-Founder & CEO Howard Marks talk about StartEngine and the future of our platform with Mr. Wonderful? Tomorrow, Friday October 2nd, at 9am PT, we will be hosting a final webinar with Howard and Kevin O’Leary, and you can RSVP here to listen to their conversation.

Howard is our fearless leader and has founded multiple businesses over the course of his career. In the ‘90s, he co-founded video game company Activision, which today has a multibillion-dollar market cap. He was also the founder & CEO of Acclaim Games, a publisher of online games that was later sold and is part of The Walt Disney Company. Howard is also bilingual and a triple national of the United States, United Kingdom, and France.

This is a great opportunity to see what our CEO is like in the final hours of our funding round, so RSVP here to attend!

What Investors Are Saying About StartEngine

“We've all had that feeling that says "I wish I was around when "x" started up." That feeling that you wanted to be in on the true ground floor of a great idea. The thought process that everyone hasn't quite grasped yet so it hasn't exploded but the momentum is amazing. Well, here we are, with an existing "product", in an expanding field, in an innovative time period for the product with a proven, successful leadership team. I could think of a million reasons to talk myself out of investing in StartEngine using standard metrics, regular valuations, assets, liabilities, and all the other run of the mill considerations. Why? What a great opportunity, vision, and potential this company has. I've invested modestly three times in StartEngine and in 14 other opportunities on the platform. I'm a very small fish. I'm really looking forward to watching what happens and I'm sitting here wondering if this is how the people around Bogle and Schwab felt early on. We'll see I guess. Good luck all.” - Mark

This investment is speculative, illiquid, and involves a high degree of risk, including the possible loss of your entire investment.

These testimonials may not be representative of the experience of other customers. These testimonials are no guarantee of future performance or success.

Kevin O’Leary is a paid spokesperson for StartEngine. Read the 17-B disclosure at https://www.startengine.com/17b

Due to overwhelming demand, we’ve decided to extend the close of our raise to Friday October 2nd at 1pm PT! We are so grateful for the support—we have raised over $3.68M in the past week, and more than 1,800 people have invested in us in the final days of our campaign.

We want to make sure that everyone who wants to invest in this offering has the opportunity to do so, and that our Investor Services team is able to help those who need assistance trying to invest in this offering.

To that end, you now have two more days to invest in StartEngine’s current funding round. 

On Friday at 9am PT, we will be hosting a final webinar with our CEO Howard Marks and Mr. Wonderful and the two will discuss the close of this funding round and what’s next for StartEngine. RSVP for that webinar here to tune in and hear an exciting announcement about StartEngine’s future!

This investment is speculative, illiquid, and involves a high degree of risk, including the possible loss of your entire investment.

Kevin O’Leary is a paid spokesperson for StartEngine. Read the 17-B disclosure at https://www.startengine.com/17b