What Is The Median Valuation Multiple For Your Industry?
Posted by Ed Fixen on 10/28/2011 11:45:00 AM

Most business owners and professionals in the M&A market like to keep tabs on valuation trends and current market-based valuation multiples for business acquisitions. This article highlights some of the results reported in the Pepperdine Private Capital Markets Winter 2011 Survey regarding some very interesting insights into recent M&A activity, including median industry valuation multiples.  Read more...

How Salable Is Your Business?
Posted by Ed Fixen on 10/21/2011 2:09:00 PM

Last week our weekly blog discussed the ‘Market for Selling Privately-Owned Businesses.’ This week we’ll discuss a topic we briefly touched on last week regarding the ‘salability’ of a specific business. It’s an odd looking word but a very important one when it comes time to sell your business. ‘Salability’ addresses both the market for a specific business (i.e., demand) and the factors unique to that business sale that determines the probability of success. Read more...

The Market For Selling A Privately-Owned Business
Posted by Ed Fixen on 10/14/2011 7:22:00 AM

The overall market for selling privately-owned business acquisitions continues to be highly industry dependent and size driven. Our business brokerage firm has begun to see minor but measurable improvement in the market since the beginning of 2010 even though it has been somewhat cyclical over that period. Even during the recession we have been able to successfully help our clients sell businesses of various sizes and industries; however we have observed some general business sales and acquisition trends during that time. One of those trends is that the market demand for businesses in certain industries and certain size criteria seem to remain strong and stable compared to other industries. Read more...

Minimizing Capital Gains Tax in a Business Sale
Posted by Ed Fixen on 10/7/2011 12:39:00 PM

In my role and experience as a business broker, it is often the manner in which deals are structured and executed that help preserve the capital of a seller that can be equally as important as the price and terms of a business sale. In a past article, I discussed the concept of Personal Goodwill as a potential tax saving strategy for some qualifying business owners that are considering selling their business. Another tool that business owners should consider when it comes time to sale a business is to potentially defer and minimize capital gains tax liability through the use of a deferred or structured sale vehicle. Read more...