Financing by Going Public

Going public, that is, selling stock or debt to the general public, is an extremely complex and massive undertaking. You should not consider going public unless your business is earning well over a million dollars in after-tax profits, has steady profitability, excellent growth prospects, and a tremendous thirst for funding that other sources can not provide.

Entrepreneurs who have taken their firms public are generally shocked by the amount of energy and anxiety that goes into the initial public offering. And, later, they are frustrated by the added demands placed on them as a CEO of a public as opposed to a private firm.