Regulations require existing businesses to provide their last two years financial statements to investors to review as part of making an informed investment decision. Required financial statements are annual Balance Sheet (or P&L) , Cash Flow Statement, and historical tax returns.
There are a few exceptions to this rule:
If the business has been in operations for less than two years, this requirement may be less.
If the business was formed within the current calendar year, you generally would only need a balance sheet as of your date of inception in order to launch a Regulation Crowdfunding campaign.
How to Get Your Financial Statements
If you use a program like Intuit Quickbooks, your balance sheet and cash flow statement are easily exportable through the following steps:
Balance Sheet
Click Reports in the left menu and then select Balance Sheet in the Business overview section.
Select Customize to change any of the settings for the report, if necessary. Ideally, this report should be as recent as possible.
Export the Balance Sheet by selecting an option in the upper right corner of the report and upload it to your Mainvest profile.
Cash Flow
Go to Reports.
In the Search field, enter Statement of Cash Flows.
Select the Statement of Cash Flows item to open the report.
(Optional) Select Customize to change any of the settings for the report, if necessary. For example, you can change the Report Period to show a wider or narrower date range. Ideally, this should include at least two years of reporting or more.
Select Run Report.
Export the report using one of the options and upload it to your Mainvest profile.
If you do not use a program like Intuit Quickbooks or your business is just getting started, you can use our Projections Builder to build out a Projected Balance Sheet.