A utilização de títulos de dívida conversíveis para o investimento anjo em startups no Brasil: Risco e segurança jurídica do investidor

Abstract

Startups play an important role on the production of innovations and on economic development. Since startups do not have all the necessary resources for the development of their business, they often look for financial support from angel investors. In Brazil, although there are some formal options to contract this type of investment, entrepreneurs decided to adopt the so-called convertible notes, strongly inspired by US practice. Such instruments may be defined as an investment made through the granting of a loan, which may be paid on the maturity date through the conversion of the debtor balance into equity. Conversion is mandatory, however, when any liquidity event occurs between the granting of the loan and the maturity. Since the convertible notes have numerous clauses of corporate nature, such instruments can not be classified as the typical institute of loan. In this way, the institute could be classified as a partnership, or as an atypical contract consecrated by customs. This dissertation conducted interviews with twelve people who participated in these operations as investors or entrepreneurs. The results confirm that convertible notes are the instrument commonly used in angel-investment operations, as well as the fact that the parties understand that they are in compliance with a legal standard that is required when using the institute. Allied to this, the result can be sustained by the perception of other similar instruments in the Brazilian legal framework, the absence of the identification of the common objectives between the parts, as well as by the theory of contractual atypicity.