Private placements in public equity (PIPEs) are proliferating; in the United States, their growth is estimated at 30% per year. PIPEs are issued as part of prospectus exemptions. Because they can alleviate the financing difficulties of growing high tech companies, they should interest the...

To protect investors, securities regulation generally restrains entrepreneurial ventures from entering the stock market. Scholars and regulators contend that strong rules and requirements for listing are essential to prevent the market from failing. However, these constraints can also unduly...

We describe and analyze how a stock exchange can be used to finance emerging companies and to assume the role usually played by private VCs. We find that the Canadian public VC market has a success rate which is approximately four times the corresponding rate for private VC. The public VC market...

In Canada, most of the private placements are offered by small and unprofitable entrepreneurial ventures -- for which the asymmetry of information and adverse selection problems are particularly acute. Private placements are a very important source of equity for these emerging businesses. In...

Acknowledging that securities regulation penalizes small growing firms in their attempt to raise equity capital, most of the Canadian provinces have recently reformed their exemption rules. These rules allow the issuance of securities outside the boundaries of securities regulation. The rules...

We analyze exit-related perceptions of the members of a large, well-structured Canadian angel group. Because they invest in high tech deals larger than CAN$1.2 million, together with venture capitalists and a matching fund, these angels should consider the initial public offering (IPO) as a...