Post-raise obligations

A successful close is the start of your relationship with your new investors, not the end. Ghana's Securities Industry Act, 2016 (Act 929), the Companies Act, 2019 (Act 992), and the SEC Ghana Crowdfunding Guidelines 2024 all impose ongoing obligations on funded issuers, and so does the Ardent CrowdFund platform agreement you signed on disbursement. This page is the authoritative checklist of what you owe, when, and what happens if you miss a deadline.

Regulated by SEC Ghana

The annual compliance calendar

Think of your post-raise compliance as four predictable moments each year, plus ad-hoc obligations that trigger on specific events. The table below covers the four predictable ones; the sections after cover triggered obligations.

1. 1

   Q1, Annual report filing

   Annual

   Within 120 days of your financial year-end, upload audited annual accounts, the directors' report, and a narrative annual update. This is the single most important filing of the year, investors and SEC Ghana both read it end-to-end.

2. 2

   Q2, AGM

   Governance

   Hold your Annual General Meeting no later than 15 months after the previous AGM, per Companies Act 2019 (Act 992). Ardent runs the meeting online through the platform, distributes notices, collects proxies, and tallies votes, your job is to prepare the pack and attend.

3. 3

   Q3, Mid-year quarterly update

   Quarterly

   The quarterly update pattern runs all year. Q3 is where most issuers share their mid-year operating review and any revised guidance for the second half.

4. 4

   Q4, Covenant and compliance attestation

   Attestation

   Before year-end, the CEO and CFO sign an annual attestation confirming compliance with every covenant in the instrument, the platform agreement, and the SEC Ghana Guidelines. A breach disclosed here is treated far more leniently than one discovered later.

Quarterly investor updates

Every Ardent CrowdFund issuer must publish a quarterly investor update while the instrument is outstanding. That is a regulatory obligation, not a marketing nicety. The minimum contents, the deadline, and the consequences of missing it are all fixed.

Minimum contents of a quarterly update

• Narrative business update covering the quarter, written by the CEO or an executive director.
• Key operating metrics for the quarter, compared against the previous quarter and the same quarter last year.
• Summary financials, revenue, gross margin, EBITDA, cash on hand , for the quarter and year-to-date.
• Any material events not separately disclosed in a material-change notice.
• A forward look for the next quarter, stated conservatively.
• For debt issuers, a covenant compliance statement.

Deadline. Within 45 calendar days of the quarter-end. Ardent's dashboard counts you down automatically and sends reminders at T-14 and T-3 days.

Consequences of missing it. Late updates trigger an escalation: a public flag on your issuer page after 7 days late, an email to every holder after 14 days, and, in persistent cases, a formal SEC Ghana notification, a platform-level suspension from running another raise, and potential investor-initiated remedies under the subscription agreement.

AGMs under the Companies Act 2019

The Companies Act, 2019 (Act 992) requires every Ghanaian company to hold an Annual General Meeting within fifteen months of its previous AGM (and within eighteen months of incorporation for a first AGM). Equity issuers on Ardent hold their AGMs on the platform:

• Notice. Minimum 21 clear days' notice to every holder on the register. Ardent distributes the notice automatically.
• Quorum. Per your company's constitution, with Ardent-tallied proxies counting toward quorum.
• Business. Receipt of the accounts and directors' report, declaration of dividends (if any), re-election of directors, appointment of auditors, and any special resolutions.
• Voting. In-app voting is open for a window set by the company secretary, proxies are handled automatically, and results are published to all holders within two business days of the meeting.
• Minutes. Uploaded to the documents vault within 14 days of the meeting.

Debt-only issuers generally do not hold AGMs, but may convene holder meetings for specific consent resolutions (for example, a requested change to an instrument covenant).

Annual audited accounts

Audited accounts are the backbone of every post-raise filing. Requirements:

• Auditor. A practising member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants, Ghana (ICAG), independent of the issuer.
• Standards. IFRS for SMEs or full IFRS, consistent with your offer document.
• Deadline. Within 120 days of your financial year-end. If your financial year ends in December, the deadline is 30 April.
• Filing. Upload the signed accounts plus the auditors' report to the issuer dashboard. Ardent files the copy required by SEC Ghana on your behalf.

If the auditor raises a material issue during the audit, flag it to Ardent's compliance team as soon as you become aware, early disclosure is always better than a late surprise.

Material change notifications

Between quarterly updates, the same material change standard used during the campaign continues to apply. Events that require an immediate material-change notice include:

• Changes in directorship, senior management, or 10%+ beneficial ownership.
• Loss, suspension, or amendment of a material contract, customer, or regulatory licence.
• New material litigation, regulatory inquiry, or enforcement action.
• A covenant breach, whether cured or not.
• A material variance between forecast and actual performance that would not wait for the next quarterly update.

How to file. From the issuer dashboard's Disclosures tab, draft a material-change notice and submit. Ardent's compliance team reviews within one business day and publishes to holders.

Raising again on the platform

Many issuers return for a second, third, or fourth raise. There is no cooling-off window between raises, the gate is compliance performance rather than elapsed time. To be re-eligible, you must:

• Have no outstanding late filings, missed updates, or unaddressed material-change items.
• Be in compliance with every covenant in your existing outstanding instruments on Ardent.
• Deliver at least two on-time quarterly updates after the most recent raise.
• Disclose the outcomes of the previous raise, use of proceeds versus plan, actuals versus projections, in the new offer document.

Well-run repeat issuers tend to move faster through due diligence the second time and often clear at materially better terms. Your track record on Ardent is your cheapest form of diligence.

SEC Ghana's ongoing oversight

What success looks like, two years in

A well-run Ardent issuer two years after their first raise looks the same across sectors: quarterly updates every 45 days on the dot, annual accounts filed by day 90, a clean AGM each year, material-change notices filed within 48 hours, and a CEO who treats investor questions as signal rather than noise. That issuer raises again quickly, at better valuations, and builds a durable capital base that opens doors well beyond the platform. Every post-raise obligation on this page is in service of that outcome.

Where to go next

• Investor reporting, the tools and templates for quarterly updates and material notices.
• Businesses FAQs, quick answers to the operational questions funded issuers ask most.
• Platform reference → Fees, the ongoing platform fees that apply post-raise.