Expanding Market Access
ICAN is aggressively challenging the SEC's paternalistic restrictions that lock everyday Americans out of wealth-building opportunities, while stifling economic growth and innovation.
While often dismissed as simply a "Wall Street problem," the SEC’s ever-expanding labyrinth of regulations often hit Main Street hardest, with the agency’s reach extending all the way down to the local food truck owner seeking to raise funds to expand his enterprise and to the long-time mom and pop store owners who, after a lifetime of work, want to put their hard-earned money to work by investing in their own community. In order to “protect” small entrepreneurs and investors, the federal government limits who can invest in private enterprise and severely restricts how small entrepreneurs can raise the capital needed to launch or expand new efforts.
Our litigation and advocacy efforts focus on modernizing crowdfunding regulations, reforming arbitrary wealth-based rules, and reducing unnecessary regulatory burdens for small businesses seeking capital.
Our Work
Litigation
Emily Kapszukiewicz & Healthcare Shares, P.B.C. v SEC
What does it say about our system when someone trusted to run a healthcare company is told she can’t invest in one? Emily, a seasoned leader with nearly a million in savings, was barred from backing a healthcare fund aligned with her own expertise because of the accredited investor rule. This rule strips away the basic right to pursue economic opportunity—a right at the heart of the American promise. Instead of empowering skilled, mission-driven people like Emily, the SEC’s wealth and income test reserves the best opportunities for the wealthy few. ICAN is stepping in to fight back.
ICAN v SEC: Challenging Inaction on Accredited Investor Reform
ICAN has challenged the SEC's outdated "accredited investor" rule that arbitrarily prevents 80% of Americans from accessing private investment opportunities based solely on wealth thresholds rather than knowledge or experience, fighting to democratize access to wealth-building opportunities for all Americans.
PulseChain- SEC v Schueler
In an unprecedented expansion of its enforcement approach, the SEC named three software programs—a blockchain token, a blockchain network, and a protocol—as defendants, prompting ICAN to file an amicus brief that successfully challenged the agency's attempt to wage war against software and secured a significant victory for the PulseChain community.
SEC v Punch TV
Joseph Collins, a Los Angeles entrepreneur, faced a ruinous $1.35 million SEC demand over a self-reported technical violation with no fraud or investor harm, until ICAN secured a complete victory rejecting the SEC's disgorgement attempt and preserving key limits on the agency's powers.
