All Companies Can Now Submit Draft IPO Registrations Confidentially

There’s a reason the public never got to view BFS Capital’s September 2015 IPO registration documents. Thanks to the JOBS Act, “an emerging growth company may confidentially submit to the Commission a draft registration statement for confidential, non-public review by the Commission staff prior to public filing.” They can then choose to abandon the offering altogether without having to suffer the fate of their financial statements being made public, which is what BFS Capital did. But if they ultimately had chosen to move forward, their documents would’ve been shared in the public domain.

A new decision handed down by the SEC is now expanding that privilege beyond “emerging growth companies” to all companies. That means that any company can submit draft documents confidentially. It will take effect on July 10th.

“This is an important step in our efforts to foster capital formation, provide investment opportunities, and protect investors,” said Director of the Division of Corporation Finance, Bill Hinman. “This process makes it easier for more companies to enter and participate in our public company disclosure-based system.”

The only reason BFS Capital’s confidential filing is known, is because the company broadcasted that they had filed accordingly in a press release.

“By expanding a popular JOBS Act benefit to all companies, we hope that the next American success story will look to our public markets when they need access to affordable capital,” said Chairman Jay Clayton. “We are striving for efficiency in our processes to encourage more companies to consider going public, which can result in more choices for investors, job creation, and a stronger U.S. economy.”

It is possible that other companies in the industry have filed draft registration statements, got discouraging feedback from the SEC and then decided to withdraw without any of their competitors being the wiser.

You can read the full explanation by the SEC here

Sean Murray is the President and Chief Editor of deBanked and the founder of the Broker Fair Conference. Connect with me on LinkedIn or follow me on twitter. You can view all future deBanked events here.