Posted: 23 May 2017

"That's a Great Opportunity for Accountants/Advisers!"

This was the reaction from an experienced principal of an accountancy business when we discussed the opportunities available from “Crowd-Sourced Funding Equity Raising”.

My colleague said “with this legislation virtually any type of client will be able to embark on a capital raising journey, in so doing avoiding the need to borrow from friends and families and taking out second and third mortgages on their own property to fund their business vision.”

“To do this successfully they are all going to need committed accountants offering a true “trusted advisor” service to guide them through and in so doing the committed accountant will have established a “new income stream”.

My accounting colleague is correct – any type of business can have a vision to raise capital from the public – up to $5 million every 12 months can be raised – but, they are going to need a committed accountant/advisers to help them to prepare the “default prospectus” known as the “Crowd-Sourced Funding Offer Document”.

There are a number of opportunities for accountants arising out of the Crowd-Sourced Funding legislation with the first listings on intermediaries' platforms (website) scheduled from 29th September 2017. Now is the time to get prepared to assist your clients and prospects to be able to avail themselves of this unique opportunity to be able to raise capital from the “crowd”. At this stage Crowd-Sourced Funding is only available for unlisted public companies. The legislation enables propriety limited companies to be converted to an unlisted public company. Whilst there has been some debate about the requirement for companies to be unlisted public companies, some people with considerable experience in the process of raising capital for small companies are very supportive of the concept that capital is to be raised by unlisted public companies primarily because of the structure of public companies, corporate governance requirements and constitutions that reflect that the shareholders will be more than family and friends which is normally the case within a proprietary limited company.?rel=0&showinfo=0" width="560" height="315" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen">

The capital raising journey starts with a “vision”:

What do they want to achieve in their business?
What is the plan for the short term?
What is the plan for 2 to 3 years' time?
What is the CEO’s dream?

The CEO should prepare an honest “SWOT” analysis on themselves and their business ideas.

The next stage is to undertake a “market review”:

Who are the potential customers?
How much will customers pay?
Who are the competitors?

A marketing plan then needs to be prepared – what has to be done to promote the business to the market?

We then move into the “accountancy/advisor phase”:

Corporate Chart – directors, managers, team.
Business Plan – articulating the vision for the next three years.
Budgets – the performance requirements for the business plan to be achieved.
Cashflow Forecasts – including how much capital is required to be raised to implement the business plan vision.
The company valuation.
The share price calculation.
Information Memorandum.
Then the Crowd-Sourced Funding Offer Document can be finalised

The Crowd-Sourced Funding Offer Document is then ready to be submitted to the Crowd-Sourced Funding Intermediary for checking. When he/she is happy the CSF Offer Document will then be able to be placed onto the CSF Intermediary’s website where the public will be able to visit to read the CSF Offer Document and hopefully invest up to $10,000 in the company.

My colleague was right “what a great opportunity for accountants to truly perform the "trusted advisor" role and create a "new income stream" ”.

An “income stream” that will range between $20,000 and $40,000 and presents a further great opportunity to offer ongoing services as a Virtual Chief Financial Officer/Director/Auditor.

Crowd-Sourced Funding Companies join Early-Stage Innovation Companies and Section 708 Capital Raising as a significant new wave of opportunities for small/medium enterprises, investors and entrepreneurs to fund their businesses and at the same time give retail investors the opportunity to invest in a vast range of different types of businesses that they have been shut out of previously.

To get started on this journey ESS BIZTOOLS and ESS BASIP have developed a special program to assist accountants/advisors – “Crowd-Sourced Funding Equity Raising Package” which you can subscribe to for only $399 including GST for 12 months 24/7 access. Click here to view more information and to subscribe.

We are presenting a special webinar “Opportunities for Accountants to Assist Small/Medium Enterprises to raise capital from:

Crowd-Sourced Funding
Early-Stage Innovation
Section 708 of the Corporations Act capital raising”

on Tuesday 30th May 2017 - 12.30pm to 1.30pm (AEST). Please (Click here) to register to participate in this webinar.

If you would like to access previous articles on Crowd-Sourced Funding click here.

If you would like to access previous webinars on Crowd-Sourced Funding click here.

If you have any questions on any aspect of Crowd-Sourced Funding or any of the other products and services produced by ESS BIZTOOLS, ESS BASIP or ESS BIZGRANTS, please contact us at or phone 1800 232 088.

www.essbiztools.com.au

www.essbasip.com.au

www.essbizgrants.com.au

Access free material:

{snippet free-report}

Podcast 'Accountant's Minute'

Latest business advisory news for Accountants in under a minute.

Episode 111 - "That's a Great Opportunity for Accountants/Advisers!"

Podcast Link:

As their trusted advisor, can you assist your SME clients with business advisory services?

To download free material click the link below:-

{snippet free-report}

Watch out for the next episode of "Accountant's Minute" or subscribe to the podcast on iTunes for more news, ideas and tips on providing outstanding non-compliance services to SME clients.