Kim Arnone

Kim Arnone specializes in developing and implementing capital raise legal strategies for impact funds, social enterprises, cooperatives and nonprofits. She designs investment offerings that can be publicly offered to community investors and/or privately offered to a client’s network. In addition to securities and finance projects, Kim also counsels clients on entity structuring, governance and compliance matters, acquisitions and other business transactions, and stock incentive plans. She also provides outside general counsel services.

She has served on the advisory boards of a variety of social enterprises, is a former Board Chair of the AIDS Legal Referral Panel, and a former board member of the Oakland Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce. Kim previously was counsel at the law firms of Pillsbury Winthrop and Buchalter Nemer. Kim has a Juris Doctorate from University of California, College of Law, San Francisco and was Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Gender and Justice.

Project Highlights

• Attorney for the first nonprofit Regulation A+ offering for TechSoup, which raised over $12 million; Counsel for the groundbreaking Regulation A+ offering by cooperative community development financial institution, Shared Capital Cooperative.
• First Regulation Crowdfunding fan ownership campaign for a U.S. professional team, Chattanooga FC, on the Wefunder platform; Attorney advisor on crowdfunding and private offerings for several more professional teams and leagues including Detroit FC, Bay Area Panthers, Caledonian Braves, Fan Owned Club, and more.
• Legal advisor (capital raise, acquisition, governance, general counsel) for groundbreaking companies across multiple impact industries including Recompose (human composting), Cubo Pods (wellness beverages), FlexAir (flight school for everyone), Ceres Chill (“free the moms” trailblazing breast milk storage), Medwave Software Solutions (affordable electronic healthcare recordkeeping), Berkeleyside (impactful local media), and more.
• Community investment fund legal and strategy advisor for CoPeace, WEPOWER Capital Fund, South Shore Chamber Community Development Corporation, and New Orleans Business Alliance, among others.

Publications and Media

• Author: Community Capital Raising Strategies (Chapter 7) in Investing for Social Impact, Economic Justice, and Racial Equity, edited by Dorcas Raejeana Gilmore, Lisa Hall, and Susan R Jones (2023)
• Author: Securities/Capital Raising (Chapter 7) in the Sustainable Economies Law Center: Worker Cooperative Law Practice Guide (2021)
• Author: Exploring Private Raise Strategies
• Author: Comparing Non-Registered Public Offering Strategies
• Featured: Wall Street Journal, As Bank Lending Tightens, Small Businesses Turn to Customers to Raise Money: Using new platforms, startups can sell bonds to small investors without giving up any equity by Ben Ashwell (July 13, 2023)
• Commenter: Oaklandside: This Oakland co-op wants to revive the legendary Esther’s Orbit Room and the Seventh Street corridor: Revitalization without displacement? The East Bay Permanent Real Estate Cooperative is trying to bring back a thriving BIPOC economic and cultural hub in West Oakland by Natalie Orenstein (June 9, 2021)
• Featured: KQED: Direct Public Offerings Let Businesses Turn Customers Into Investors by Laura Klivans (March 16, 2016)

Kim enjoys spending time with family, especially playing games, and happily attends (and acts as chauffeur) to her son’s various sporting events.