As Squamish, on B.C.'s busy west coast, cements its reputation as the Outdoor Capital of Canada, it opens up a challenge, what do you do if you can't or don't want to do extreme sports?
The National Crowdfunding & Fintech Association (NCFA Canada) is a financial innovation ecosystem that provides education, market intelligence, industry stewardship, networking and funding opportunities and services to thousands of community members and works closely with industry, government, partners and affiliates to create a vibrant and innovative fintech and funding industry in Canada. Decentralized and distributed, NCFA is engaged with global stakeholders and helps incubate projects and investment in fintech, alternative finance, crowdfunding, peer-to-peer finance, payments, digital assets and tokens, blockchain, cryptocurrency, regtech, and insurtech sectors. 
In many ways, OurCrowd epitomizes the aspirations of what investment crowdfunding has the potential to deliver for both issuers and investors. By providing access to quality deals to smaller (accredited) investors, OurCrowd has opened up an asset class previously closed off to all but the very fortunate. On OurCrowd, you can find yourself investing alongside some of the biggest names in venture capital – at the exact same terms – an important distinction. It is also important to note that OurCrowd has skin in the game for each offering it lists on the platform – thus interests are aligned: OurCrowd wants the company to succeed and it also very much wants to see a return on its own investment. These qualities make OurCrowd a compelling option for investors that are willing to shoulder an element of portfolio risk that can also drive some outsized returns.
Businesses wishing to raise money from retail investors will no longer have to convert to an unlisted public company structure, after an amendment to 2017's equity crowdfunding legislation passed federal Parliament.
The legislation, which takes effect in 28 days from Wednesday, allows proprietary companies or unlisted public companies with annual turnover or gross assets of up to $25 million to advertise their business plans on ASIC-licensed crowdfunding portals, and raise up to $5 million a year to carry them out. Investors can put up to $10,000 a year each into an unlimited number of ideas.
Australian private companies are typically limited to a maximum of 50 non-employee shareholders. However, under these reforms, investors acquiring shares through a crowdfunding portal are excluded from this cap, allowing private companies to raise funds from potentially hundreds or thousands of investors.
See: Australia and UK set up FinTech Bridge to deepen collaboration between governments, regulators, and industry bodies
Proprietary companies with crowdfunded shareholders will have to prepare annual financial and directors' reports in accordance with accounting standards.
A recent 
In a letter forwarded to Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Jay Clayton, a group of Fintech leaders demanded the Commission to increase Regulation Crowdfunding (Reg CF) from the current $1.07 million max amount to $20 million – a substantial increase to current rules. The demand to increase Reg CF, an iteration of securities crowdfunding that was created by the JOBS Act of 2012, comes at a time when there is pressure for the US to maintain is position as a leader in investment crowdfunding the space. As pointed out by the signatories, both Germany and the UK have increased their crowdfunding threshold to €8 million (USD $9.4 million). The European Commission may move to make this a pan-European threshold with some EU insiders pushing for a higher amount.
It might be the definitive sign that cryptocurrencies have arrived on Wall Street.
In a significant policy move by the UK government, the threshold for investment crowdfunding has been upped to €8 million thus matching the recent change by 
