After a wait of almost 18 months, the acronym-friendly Jump-start Our Business Start-ups Act (or JOBS Act for short) will go into effect on Monday, September 23. When President Barack Obama originally signed the law in April 2012, most observers took the new law at face value. Supporters insisted that it would undo many of the impediments to initial public offerings (IPOs) that were the direct consequences of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, originally passed in 2002, and would significantly revamp the way in which private capital is raised in the United States, thereby creating jobs and fostering growth. After much delay and procrastination, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) finally adopted rules in July to implement these changes, months after the Congressional-imposed deadline had past. Experts, however, began feverishly focusing on another group of beneficiaries to the JOBS Act liberalizations – namely, alternative investment vehicles, such as hedge funds and private equity funds. More in Forbes here.
