What “Accredited Investor” Or Other Investor Type Definitions Apply In Exempt Offerings Rules?

What “Accredited Investor” Or Other Investor Type Definitions Apply In Exempt Offerings Rules?   By: William A. Price, Esq., Growthlaw.com, Warrenville, IL     What is an accredited investor and why should a small business owner care?   SEC rules and most state securities laws have much less stringent requirements for preregistration of offerings and…

Historical Reasons For Companies Are Good Questions To Ask About Yours

When Roman tenants stumbled back into the lobby of their apartment buildings after a night of drinking, they probably threw a few coins into a clay pot by the stairway. If they died of drink (or the lead lined pipes, or the diseases that city life still features), the coins in the pot would pay…

ISBA LLC and S Corporation Tax Seminar Free Powerpoint

Jim Nepple and I presented a half day seminar on LLC and S corporation tax issues on May 15, 2018. My part focused on what pass-through entities are, and how Illinois LLC operating agreements should be modified to define agency authority (e.g., who can sign contracts for the company) and manager rights, if the company…

New Illinois Bar Video On Buying And Selling A Business

The Illinois State Bar Association just posted a video with me talking about the documents you need to negotiate in the course of buying or selling a business, from the initial nondisclosure/noncircumvent that allows buyers and sellers to exchange confidential information to the term sheet which outlines their deal to the final sales contract (with…

Exit Plans Do Not Always Require A Sale

Exit Plans Do Not Always Require A Sale So what else can you do besides selling? What constitutes a successful business exit? A few examples, which does not need to include selling everything to strangers as part of your plan: All in the family: The Tuttle family, of Dover, New Hampshire, kept a dairy operation…

Record Level Of Venture Investments In China

Venture capital investments in China reached $15.3 billion during 2015, significantly higher than the previous high of $7.3 billion in 2011. Mobile device deals predominated, with an average of $9.8 million per deal. Exits have also seen growth, with 61 deals raising $7.2 billion of venture backed company IPO’s in China in 2014, the last…

Parent companies may not be liable for their subsidiary company’s contracts and other liabilities

The First District of the Illinois Appellate Court, in Saletech, LLC v. East Balt, Inc. et. al., 2014 IL App (1st) 132639, https://www.state.il.us/court/Opinions/AppellateCourt/2014/1stDistrict/1132639.pdf, upheld a decision that a distribution agent who claimed that the European parent of a Ukrainian subsidiary had agreed to implement an exclusive US distribution rights deal with the Ukrainian subsidiary in…

Lying On Expense Reports Can Eliminate Rights To All Compensation, Even For A Company President

The First District of the Illinois Appellate Court upheld a $9.8 million award for ICD Publications, Inc. against Ian Gittlitz this December, http://www.state.il.us/court/Opinions/AppellateCourt/2014/1stDistrict/1133277.pdf Mr. Gittlitz had admitted to fraudulently taking more than $1 million in advances on entity distributions, without information to the other two co-owners of ICD Publications, Inc. He had signed an agreement…

Business Owner Asset Loan Guarantees Don’t Produce Personal Title To Assets

Owners of part of a business who guarantee auto or other asset loans for the company do not get title to the asset for which the loan is made. They may or may not even get credit for a capital contribution to the company, depending on the internal organizational agreements (partnership agreement for a partnership,…

Buy-Sell Agreements

There are two times that business partners argue: when they have money, and when they don’t. Those alternatives cover all available time segments, so if you’re advising people on how they should organize their business, some rules for the arguments may be in order. The classic horror story about such arguments is the Illinois appellate…