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Fquare's Agriculture Crowdfunding Platform

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Fquare, the newly-launched crowdfunding startup, today announced the launch of its agriculture crowdfunding platform.
NEW YORK, Sept. 18, 2012 /PRNewswire-iReach/ -- Fquare, the newly-launched crowdfunding startup, today announced the launch of its agriculture crowdfunding platform. Land, the chief measure by which the American colonists gauged their wealth, is making a comeback. Though sophisticated financial markets and industrialization had supplanted property ownership by the late 20th century, this once neglected asset has pushed its way back into the consciousness of institutional investors like BlackRock® and Tiaa-Cref®, Fquare seeks to bring the "crowd" along for the ride. Driving this enthusiasm are global forces so large they can be difficult to fathom. World population, expanding by 200,000 people a day, is expected to reach 7 billion this year — with fewer than 1 billion living in the developed world. Globalization used to be about exports to the United States and Europe but now workers in China, Brazil, India and Poland are becoming consumers. And it's putting a huge demand on the physical infrastructure of the earth. These changes represent not a passing trend but a fundamental shift that is "almost impossible to reverse," says Charles Polanco, founder and CEO of Fquare. Young people everywhere want a shot at improving their lives. Social media isn't just fomenting political uprisings; it is fomenting an uprising in the standard of living as the entire world becomes intimately aware of how others are living. Meeting those demands for a better life require unprecedented resources of food and fuel. Food For A Hungry World. Arable land worldwide will shrink to half an acre or so per person by 2030, according to the United Nations, down from more than an acre in 1960 and three-quarters of an acre in 2000. "With more people and less land, farmland values should only increase over the long term," says Charles Polanco.

And though for decades, the capacity of U.S. farmers outstripped demand for their products, now capacity and consumption are approaching a one-to-one ratio — thanks in no small part to the rapidly expanding needs of developing nations. China, for example, now imports half of all U.S. soybeans exports. Farmland as an Investment. Most people who buy farms as an investment lease their property to professional farmers. Still, it takes a considerable financial commitment to diversify one's holdings sufficiently across crops and geographical regions. Illiquidity is another factor to consider, because selling a farm is far more complex than unloading even a large chuck of stock. That's where Fquare comes in. On Fquare, investors collectively crowd sourced capital to buy farmland through micro-investments across all crops and geographical regions. To fix Illiquidity, Fquare also launched a secondary market where investors can sell ownership shares in farmland to other investors, providing additional liquidity to an already Illiquid market. Steady income. Cash leases on farmland return on Avg. 5% in net annual income on Fquare. Principal and risk protection. During the financial crisis, when shorter-term Treasury yields dropped almost to zero, farm owners enjoyed principal protection similar to that offered by Treasuries while continuing to receive rental income at the normal rates. By structuring a cash lease, the farmer, meanwhile, rather than the farm owner, assumes such risks as bad weather and insect infestations, and pays operational expenses. And farms are virtually immune to labor strikes, pension battles and the like. Ease and simplicity. On Fquare, buying farmland is like buying stock on NYSE®. Each share is valued at a square yard of farmland. As farmland values increase the share price reflects these changes. Fquare collects rent payments from the farmers and distributes the payments to investors monthly. Investors can sell shares on the secondary market without having to sell the farm.

Fueling The Future: Corn. The 2012 ethanol mandate, which sets the benchmark for fuel production, is 13.2 billion gallons—about 4.5 billion bushels of corn. Since last year, more corn has gone to ethanol than to feed. Ethanol has become an almost $20 billion dollar business. About Fquare, Inc. For many farmers, the need to sell the farm while continuing to provide for their families and workers is a very difficult and stressful decision to make. Fquare helps farmers succeed while making it profitavle for investors "the crowd" to invest in them. Media Contact: Charles Polanco Fquare, Inc., 8775788243, charles.polanco@fquare.com News distributed by PR Newswire iReach: https://ireach.prnewswire.com SOURCE Fquare, Inc.

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Fquare, the newly-launched crowdfunding startup, today announced the launch of its agriculture crowdfunding platform. Land, the chief measure by which the American colonists gauged their wealth, is making a comeback. Though sophisticated financial markets and industrialization had supplanted property ownership by the late 20th century, this once neglected asset has pushed its way back into the consciousness of institutional investors like BlackRock® and Tiaa-Cref®, Fquare seeks to bring the "crowd" along for the ride.

SOURCE:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/fquares-agriculture-crowdfunding-platform-170162906.html

Tags: agriculture, Crowdfunding, Crowdsource, Crowdsourcing, Fquare, land

Posted by Benjamin Fossel

Sep 18, 2012 01:58 pm GMT Viewed 1370 times

Author: Fquare, Inc. Source

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