WASHINGTON (June 10, 1999) – Small businesses in the Mid-Atlantic region that want to raise capital by selling securities can take part in a new program offered by state securities regulators that streamlines the review process, potentially saving them time and money.

The Mid-Atlantic Regional Review (MARR) program is offered by Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia. Maryland administers the program.

The MARR program works like this: Each state in which the company wants to sell securities will review the issuer’s disclosure documents. Comments will be consolidated into one comment letter from the “lead” state examiner. The company will then be able to resolve all issues regarding multi-state filing through that one examiner.

“With the MARR Program, small businesses raising capital can save considerable time and money,” said Tim Cox of the Maryland Securities Commission. “The small company can eliminate repetitive responses to state comments and can better time the commencement of an offering.”

Program guidelines are available free of charge from the Maryland Securities Division, 200 Saint Paul Place, 20th Floor, Baltimore, MD 21202 or on the Pennsylvania Securities Commission`s website, http://www.psc.state.pa.us.

The MARR program is the fourth of its kind set up by members of the North American Securities Administrators Association (NASAA) for Small Corporate Offering Registrations (SCOR) and offerings under federal SEC Regulation A. The others are the New England region, the Mid-Western region and the Western region. In all, 33 states are now part of the regional review program. In addition, 43 states take part in the similar national Coordinated Equity Review (CER) program for larger offerings also registered with the SEC.