This week’s digest examines how many private equity firms there are in the U.S., the effect baby boomer business owners will have on the merger and acquisition market, and where American buyers look for target opportunities after the U.S. Click on the headline to read the full piece.
How Many Private Equity Firms Are There?
“Throughout the years we have talked quite a bit about private equity (PE) firms – how they operate, what they focus on, and how they can add tremendous value to their holdings by providing not only capital but managerial talent, financial strategies, and marketing/sales muscle. But what we haven’t analyzed is how all these features are actually driving firms’ growth and expansion.
A recent article on PitchBook, a leading research organization focusing on alternative investment sources, caught my attention. Because for the first time, it became clear that for sellers looking for full or partial investors, now is the best time in our history to find them. There are more PE firms looking for deals than ever before.”
Baby Boomer Business Owners – The Retirement Conundrum
“Although the overall impact on society will be huge, the reality is baby boomer business owners, as they retire and presumably seek buyers for their companies, could overwhelm the market. Bill Entwistle, a Rhode Island-based financial planner,reportedly told journalist Mark Miller:
‘It’s also possible that as all boomer business owners head toward the exits at the same time, they’ll flood the market with companies for sale during a weak economy and not be able to extract the value they anticipated … Now that the economy is starting to get better the value of the business may be rebounding, but they will all want to get out at the same time.'”
U.K. Market Attracting Record U.S. Buyers
“In October Generational Equity re-introduces its services to business owners in the United Kingdom. We will be holding a series of exit planning workshops that are based upon our North American symposiums but will contain content that is relevant to business owners in the United Kingdom. We are very excited to be re-entering this market because based on our research, the U.K. is one of the favorite markets for U.S.-based business acquirers.
In fact, according to PitchBook (a research firm focusing on alternative sources of funding), historically the U.K. has been a favorite destination of U.S.-based buyers for quite some time.”
© 2015 Generational Equity, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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