Alternative Investments, Buying & Selling a Company, Exit Planning

SBA Loans Help Finance Small Business, #1

In challenging times, small businesses can look for liquidity and financing in many places.  The various SBA loan programs are one of the better places to search. Because SBA loan guaranty requirements and practices can be change by the government at any time, it is important for applicants to obtain current and accurate information. This article is merely intended to help a business owner ( potential borrower) start thinking about these programs.  You must do your own investigation and research. The information here is not to considered legal or financial advice.  Just a prompt to start thinking about the topic.…

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Alternative Investments

What is an Alternative Investment?

Alteris LLC provides consulting services to those investors considering putting their capital to work in the sometimes ambiguous Alternative Investment (AI) asset class. We have worked on a wide variety of types of projects though most are in private equity and venture capital.   Some of these could be considered rather non-mainstream including complex derivatives, a mega farm in Brazil, and innovative technology start-ups in Africa among others.  Though most have been located in the USA and Europe. Alternative Investments as a category are defined differently by different people. Here is our attempt at it. Generally, an Alternative Investment can be…

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Alternative Investments, Decision Making

What good are derivatives and futures? To keep the tulips in line!

One of the greatest bubbles of all time was the Dutch Tulip mania that collapsed in 1637. At one point before the collapse, a couple of Tulip bulbs were worth enough to buy a house. I can only imagine the sweet schadenfreude of the average Dutch citizen watching the demise of their fellow countryman when the bubble burst. This was probably the first recorded speculative bubble. So what caused that bubble to occur? For this discussion, let’s replace tulips with Bitcoin. No this is not an arbitrary bait-and-switch metaphor. The two possess the same dynamic and the example is more…

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Alternative Investments, Buying & Selling a Company

What Is Mezzanine Capital?

I get asked this question occasionally. The question is usually asked by non-financial directors/officers of client companies. It just came up again so here is a description. Usually mezzanine capital is defined as unsecured, higher-yielding loans that are subordinate to bank loans and other secured loans but rank above equity in the event of liquidation. Here is a more in depth explanation. Mezzanine is junior debt that is between senior debt and equity on the balance sheet. Therefore it is called mezzanine, a Latin word that means “middle.” But there is more. Mezzanine capital now means more than just subordinated…

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Alternative Investments, Decision Making

The New(er) Strategies for Massive Startup Success

What can we learn from the startup efforts of companies that became wildly successful? What lessons can we take from the successful companies in the innovation hubs? I am talking about the massively successful startups – the ones that become unicorns (worth $1 billion or more). I’m not talking about smaller-scale, less ambitious startups. Mostly only those with unicorn potential. Startup land is a dynamic field. What works now and has worked in the past may not be a good template in the future. A lot of what succeeds in one time and place may not work in another. That…

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Alternative Investments, Decision Making

Streaks and Probability. Does the “Hot Hand” exist?

In a previous post, I talked generally about the usefulness of gaming theory for business decision-making. The situation where a gaming sponsor – the casino – controls all aspects affecting the outcome. To the determinant of the ‘player.’ There are many mental traps decision-makers fall into that create bad decisions. A lack of understanding of probability and statistics is a big one. Let’s examine “streaks” and “hot hands”. Statistics students are taught about the normal distribution. Investopedia defines a normal distribution as “a probability distribution that is symmetric about the mean, showing that data near the mean are more frequent…

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Alternative Investments, Decision Making

Luck, Casino Gambling and Decision Making

I’ve known a few people with gambling problems.  Some research indicates that 4% of active gamblers develop a problem. A gambling problem is never good.  Observing their gambling issues stimulated my interest in the psychology of gambling and how it affects those people. More interesting is how the same psychological traps that gamblers fall into also affect business decision-making in a broader sense.   There is a wider application than just the “controlled” setting of gambling games. Decision theorists have developed an entire field of study called Game Theory that, in part, looks at this.  Applying game situations and their related…

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