Legislation that will allow New Jersey residents to invest in New Jersey based companies, startups, innovators and entrepreneurs was signed into law Nov. 9th.
The law was originally introduced in 2013 by Senator Joe Kyrillos. It will allow people to engage in online crowdfunding within the state and allows New Jersey-based entrepreneurs to seek up to $1 million in private investment in increments of up to $5,000 from unaccredited investors residing in New Jersey without costing taxpayers extra money.
Crowdfunding is a way to fund projects by collecting small amounts of money from a large amount of people. Popular crowdfunding sites are Kickstarter, GoFundMe, and indiegogo.
“At a time when conventional sources of financing are scarce, this new law will help New Jersey’s innovators seek private capital from the investing public to develop their products or services right here in our state,” said Kyrillos.
“Crowdfunding will level the playing field for future employers, giving those without access to Wall Street a chance to gain startup capital quickly and grow their business with the support of the community.”
Senator Kyrillos explained that more than 90 percent of New Jersey employers are small businesses owners, which accounts for more than half of the state’s private-sector workforce.
“We grow jobs and opportunities for people here by eliminating opportunity-crushing regulations and antiquated roadblocks to ingenuity and economic revitalization principally driven by our state’s small businesses,” Kyrillos said. “Unaccredited investors have always been able to risk capital in the public markets and now they can as well in private companies, small businesses, and entrepreneurial start-ups.”
The law, formerly S-712/A-2073, gathered bipartisan sponsorship from Senate Democrats Cruz-Perez and Lesniak, as well as Assembly Democrats Angel Fuentes and Upendra Chivukula.
This legislation is part of the Senate Republican’s 36-bill package that was designed to jumpstart job creation and economic growth without costing taxpayers extra money. So far, 15 of the bills have garnered Senate Democrat sponsorship; 12 have garnered Assembly Democrat sponsorship; the Senate has advanced or fully passed 11 of them and the Assembly has advanced or passed a number of them as well.
