AdultVest.com: srsly, have you seen the profit margins on boobies?

Business 2.0 has a feature on AdultVest.com, a service that matches investors (with purses of varying depth) and adult entertainment companies (with profit margins of various girth).

Whenever mainstream news reports repeat rosy, seldom-factchecked figures like $12 billion to describe the size of the porn industry, I cringe. Porn =! get rich quick, any more than internet = get rich quick, and there's more to those numbers than typically meets the ink.

Leaving aside what feels like an oversimplified and overeager portrayal of the sector's investment risks (actual f'in quote: "there's silly money to be made here"), it's still an interesting feature. Just read with an extra-healthy helpin' of skepticism.

Snip:

The response has been strong: Koenig says he's signed up well over 1,000 potential investors since January. For now, he's catering to investors with big money, although he says his approach will eventually evolve to serve the investing masses. He's raising money for two funds: a $100 million fund that requires a minimum investment of $1 million, and a $10 million fund with a $100,000 minimum.

Accredited investors can sign up on AdultVest.com to qualify, and Koenig says people are signing up at the rate of 15 per day. Roughly 300 companies - including website-porn subscription businesses, escort services, and strip clubs - have registered. Investors can also use the AdultVest marketplace to hook up directly with companies.

Koenig has a good track record: The New World Partners hedge fund, where he was a managing director, posted double- and triple-digit returns through the late '90s - and he thinks similar returns are possible with porn. His funds are set up like any venture capital fund and will invest in a range of businesses, with a portion of each earmarked for buying and running strip clubs.

Link to story.

Here's the AdultVest website: Link (warning, annoying loud sound, obnoxious Flash, and silly looking porno spokesavatar).

At left here, my favorite part of the AdultVest.com design aesthetic.

It's like -- "Investors, have the first look at all the hot new deals... UP OUR ASS!"

(thanks, Susannah Breslin)

Reader comment: Cory Silverberg says,

There was a piece in the Times a few days ago by Matt Richtel ("A Thaw in Investment Prospects for Sex-Related Businesses? Maybe" -- Link). The piece displays a similarly simplistic understanding of the place and meaning of sex businesses in our society ("they like us, they really like us"), but at least it highlighted one of my favorite high end sex toy makers.