On September 14, 2017, the staff of the SEC's Division of Corporation Finance (the "Staff") issued three new compliance and disclosure interpretations ("C&DIs") addressing Regulation A offerings with a concurrent Exchange Act registration and clarifying when financial statements must be current and when annual and quarterly financial statements must be filed.  Highlights of the C&DIs (Questions 182.21, 182.22 and 182.23) include, among other things, the following guidance:

  • When an issuer registers a class of its securities pursuant to the Exchange Act on a Form 8-A concurrently with (i.e., within 5 days after) the qualification of a post-qualification amendment to a Form 1-A, the financial statements in the post-qualification amendment must be current at the time it is qualified.
  • If an issuer's qualified Form 1-A did not contain financial statements for the last full fiscal year preceding the fiscal year of effectiveness of the Form 8-A (filed concurrently with the qualification of a post-qualification amendment to the Form 1-A), then the Staff would not object if the issuer files its first annual report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year preceding the fiscal year in which the Form 8-A went effective within 90 calendar days after effectiveness of the Form 8-A.
  • If an issuer's qualified Form 1-A did not contain financial statements for one or more quarterly periods that followed the most recent annual or semi-annual period for which financial statements were included in the Form 1-A and that were completed prior to effectiveness of the Form 8-A, then the issuer is required to file quarterly reports for these quarterly periods.  The Staff would not object if the issuer files a Form 10-Q for the completed quarterly period, or two Forms 10-Q if financial statements for more than one quarterly period were not included in the Form 1‑A, within 45 days after effectiveness of the Form 8-A.

Because of the generality of this update, the information provided herein may not be applicable in all situations and should not be acted upon without specific legal advice based on particular situations.

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