PRACTICE POINTERS
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Practice Pointers is a new feature of EB5 Investors Magazine, established to provide a venue for seasoned
practitioners to share their experiences working in the EB-5 field. Topics may vary from issue to issue but
the theme will remain the same—real world, practical accounts for attorneys, developers and investors. In
this installment, Michael Homeier discusses the invaluable contributions of business lawyers and H. Ronald
Klasko talks marketing while lawyering.
The Business Lawyer
Beyond
Just
Securities
by Michael G. Homeier
While immigration attorneys are often front and
center in EB-5 transactions, securities lawyers
are understood to play an essential role in the
process that is only ignored at a business’s great
peril. EB-5 professionals now know that the
Securities and Exchange Commission considers
EB-5 investment opportunities to involve securities. Securities lawyers readily take on the task
of generating the complex sets of disclosure
documents essential to satisfy the U.S. securities law requirement that prospective investors
be provided with all material facts about the
proposed investment opportunity prior to
investing, to help assure that the investment
decision is as informed as possible. In addition
to actually drafting the disclosure documents,
securities lawyers also actively advise clients
about how to lawfully conduct their offerings
using those documents, and whom to work with
to help sell their securities.
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Some lawyers specialize only in securities work, and within
that broader umbrella definition, many focus on only a select
part of the overall universe of such work: some in private offerings (Reg D and Reg S), some on broker-dealer issues (registration and compensation), and others on one or the other of the
1940 Acts (the Investment Company or Investment Adviser
Acts). Beyond just securities, many other lawyers combine an
emphasis in securities law with the wearing of an additional
hat—that of a business lawyer. Business lawyers are as vital to
the success of every EB-5 business as the securities lawyers, as
they consider EB-5 in the context of real-world business.
E B 5 I n v esto rs M ag a z i n e