[abrazame]

I'm unsure about this. On the one hand, it does seem unfair to exclude people who aren't rich from particular kinds of investment. On the other, it might be a good protection for the overall system. The investments we're talking about here aren't your everyday shares and funds, they're the riskier stuff. It doesn't play well on TV to show a grandmother crying over the loss of her retirement savings and some smarmy banker saying "well, Ms Strawman clearly accepted the risks that were set out plain as day on page 2915 of Annex A7 to the disclosure bundle". Before you know it, media pressure leads to bad regulations that mean no one is allowed to make these risky investments.

[AnthonyMouse]

The real problem here is that the constraint is on how much money you have regardless of how much money you're investing.

If your net worth is $20M and you're investing $20,000, losing all of it clearly wouldn't bankrupt you. If your net worth is $20,000 and you're investing $20,000, losing all of it clearly would bankrupt you.

But then you say to the person with $20,000 that they can't invest $500. Which is kind of nonsense.

[sgc]

Absolutely this. Just make a percentage of net worth requirement. It's pretty hard to find a decent investment if you can't join a syndication or invest in much of anything that has not already been through the ringer of the wealthy a few times, and played out.