Why can only US residents participate in some IPOs?

External question — Personal Finance Stack Exchange Author: Franck Dernoncourt Original post: https://money.stackexchange.com/questions/169698 License: CC BY-SA 4.0 — https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ Adaptation: HTML converted to plain text; contact email addresses removed. I read these kinds of disclaimers regarding IPOs in US markets (the quote below is from E-Trade's internal portal): To participate in the [company name] IPO through [broker name], you do not need a minimum account balance, but you must be a U.S. resident with an active, eligible brokerage or IRA account and a completed Investor Profile. [broker name] acts as part of the [bank name] underwriter network. Why can only US residents participate in some IPOs in the US?

External answer — Personal Finance Stack Exchange Author: littleadv Original post: https://money.stackexchange.com/a/169699 License: CC BY-SA 4.0 — https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ Adaptation: HTML converted to plain text; contact email addresses removed. To make the brokers' lives easier. Having foreign customers is a regulatory headache that they prefer to avoid since it's a niche market within the US anyway. IPOs have additional restrictions , and brokers who may otherwise allow foreign clients for simpler transaction types may prefer to avoid dealing with these restrictions by restricting their access. Not all brokerages have this restriction. For example, I see no such restriction mentioned here .