"Your criticism of the public markets is right on the money (pun intended), but the logic is flawed.  The fact that SEC-regulated public markets are infested with fraud doesn't preclude the fact that an unregulated market consisting entirely of small investors and small companies with zero mandatory transparency could be orders of magnitude worse.  In fact I think that's guaranteed to be the case.  Here's my whole analysis: http://bottomlinelawgroup.com/..." - Antone Johnson