All Things Angel Investing #16

Including: YC Demo Day + Accreditation Updates + Angel Check Sizes

In investing news this week, the SEC approved updates to the accredited investor definition to now include: spouses (who can now pool resources), members of investment teams and those with various financial certificates (likes Series 7). Katherine Wu of Notation Capital has a good explainer thread here. Also interesting is wording that opens the door to new types of certifications being created. Jason Calacanis jumped in and was quick to say he wants Launch to pursue such an offering. Overall these updates won't change much, but it is good to see improving access to private markets moving in a better (merit-based) direction.

---

Being Talked About

• Welcome to IA's newest members!

• Congrats to Cameron Porter (AlleyCorp) on announcing Core

• Intangible friend, Winter Mead, launched a new Substack

• Discussion of YC Demo Day: list of companies from Day 1 & Day 2 (Slack)

• Is anyone investing in the Dragoneer’s or Kevin Hartz’s SPAC? (Slack)

---

Check It Out

• The Beach Read: The Inside Story of Robinhood's Billionaire Founders

• Learn: Bill Gurley on SPACs/direct listings as the future of the IPO

• Fascinating: Monster list of Cameo's top earners

• Get Smarter: @datarade did a live Periscope making real-time growth suggestions for startups (click to watch). Would it be fun to do this with an angel toward pitches or decks? 👇

Adam Townsend @adamscrabble

Shark tank w/@datarade and startups. It's a speed round. You tell him your startup co and he'll give you new & innovative ways to improve marketing/client acquisition. It's 🔥 pscp.tv/w/chb2JDFQbUVx…

pscp.tvAdam Townsend @adamscrabbleShark tank w/@datarade and startups. It’s a speed round. You tell him your startup co and he’ll give you new & innovative ways to improve marketing/client acquisition. It’s 🔥

---

Insightful Threads

While I had not heard of this before, one of our members confirmed he and other founders he knows have gifted pre-revenue startup shares to family members using the $10k gifting laws as a wealth accumulation strategy:

Patrick McKenzie @patio11

Realized some people don’t know this: It is fairly common for founders to give money as a gift to parents or other family members and have them immediately invest the money in a new company, at a very low valuation. This is not to fund the company but rather to assist family.

Ilya Sukhar had a great post this week on angel check-sizing and David Goldberg sparked good comments on the same topic:

David Goldberg @davidrgoldberg

I’ve made about a dozen angel investments. Looking back, I wish I made twice as many at half the dollar amounts.

---

Deals

• Plenty of action this week: A tech-driven investment manager for real estate debt, a social fitness app, Opendoor for Mexico, language learning via translated websites, income insurance, a curated digital art marketplace using blockchain, psychedelic treatments for mental health, automation for tracking their carbon emissions and more (#pitches)

---

Parting Thought

Shreya @shreya_sud

YC Demo Day: When men pitch: I worked at Palantir for a couple years. Invest in me. When women pitch: I have multiple PhDs and credentials in bioengineering + informatics, have done my scientific research for several years before entering YC, and we’re already profitable.

🔥🔥 Are you an active angel? Do yourself a favor and apply to join our crew!

Feedback // suggestions // ideas? Say hello@intangiblevc.com