Wouldn't you know that after I'd just finished posting about the soldiers of the 7 Deadly Sins Army ... notably General Pride and his two prized henchmen, Major Envy and Major Jealousy, and their infection of the $10 trillion merger boom that mostly failed its shareholders ... that I'd discover…
A recent report from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation entitled After Inception – How Enduring is Job Creation by Start-ups?”, uncovered several notable findings about the job creation power of start-ups:
So what? (more…)
That’s the phrase one of my oldest and closest banker friends always used – he became the President of a major division of a major bank before he retired. You may not know that word – and it’s at least a “50-center”, maybe more, but he loved it and used it on me all the time.
… pause … have you looked it up yet or are you waiting for me to tell you? … come on ….
Yeah, that’s what I thought. Okay. It means charitable, as in “we’re not a charitable organization” … meaning we do have a few basic rules:
Those are the basic rules … which is why I’m getting pretty tired of the endless news articles and blog posts about the lack of adequate capital for small business. (more…)
Today there's constant bickering among advocates who claim that the banking community is unwilling to lend to small businesses, and those who say that small businesses won't need loans until their business improves. Since we've finally solved the chicken or the egg question, maybe we can use the same HECToR…
In Cash for Chocolate, WSJ outlines several creative ways to raise funds for those of you looking for an innovative solution. I like the idea of "chocolate bonds" where you receive a box of chocolates every month as part of your investment return, or receive a "grocery discount" when investing in a…
You wouldn’t think it would be too hard to sort out whether this is no small business lending because there is no capital … or because small businesses aren’t asking. There’s a lot here so keep reading if you want to gain a better understanding of what’s REALLY going on.
The Wall Street Journal recently carried an article, Big Bank’s Lending Programs Yielding Few Results So Far, which summarizes efforts by big banks like Goldman Sachs Group, Citigroup and Bank of America, under pressure from the Obama Administration, to launch programs to increase lending to entrepreneurs. Most of these programs are Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFI’s) – oh, great, another financial algorithm – which primarily lend to small businesses in low income areas – a worthy program but hardly a program targeted at the broad small business community.
Three days earlier in, A Credit Crunch That Lingers, the WSJ pointed out that only half of small businesses that tried to borrow last year got what they needed according to (more…)
Yesterday, I referenced a shorthand version of a business plan outline. Most of you saw the words "business plan" and immediately started looking for the key to the gun cabinet, conveniently placed right next to the liquor cabinet ... because that phrase usually incites a painful, grinding noise between your…
I've written numerous posts about business plans ... the importance of preparing them, what should be in them, etc. Seth Godin has another, very simplified concept about what's really needed: * Truth * Assertions * Alternatives * People * Money Cuts to the quick, doesn't it? What do think is…
“If I am through learning, I am through.”– John Wooden
Some of you will remember – back in the day – the E. F. Hutton commercials that intoned, “When E.F. Hutton speaks, people listen.” (Some of you are probably wondering – who is E.F. Hutton in the first place?) These days, the Sage of Omaha has taken their place and has the ear of many. When I finished re-reading Warren Buffett’s Annual Letter to Shareholders, it resonated with similar messages in a number of recent articles.
From a Wall Street Journal article on March 25 discussing Conoco/Phillips’ future plans: “We asked ourselves, ‘What is growth?’” an executive said. “Growth could be viewed as just growing absolute volumes, but we felt that in this challenging environment what’s really important is to grow the value of the company.”
Or this one, from an article in the April 5 edition of Business Week about the Sears/K-Mart merger: “Simplistic analyses … ignore the fact that negative or below-market returns on invested capital are as harmful to creditors as to shareholders.”
Finally, in Warren Buffett’s shareholder letter, (more…)