News and Notes from EIG
Articles by Ira Elijah and Econ International Group. Valuation, deals, and the economy, in plain English.
More Owners Are Starting to Think About the Exit
More owners are starting to think about the exit. 12.8% said they plan to sell, up from 11.0% last year.
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One Soft Quarter Is Not a Frozen Market
One soft quarter is not a frozen market. Put together, buyers are still buying. They are just pickier.
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The Average Multiple Fell. That Does Not Mean Your Business Is Worth Less
The average multiple fell. That does not mean your business is worth less.
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Nearly One in Three Owners Still Do Not Have a Succession Plan
Most owners agree a succession plan matters. Nearly one in three still do not have one.
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Asking for Money and Getting It Are Two Different Things
Asking for money and getting it are two different things. The Federal Reserve Banks' 2025 Small Business Credit Survey heard from 6,525 small employer firms.
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Why Waiting on Funding Costs You More
A big private lender now pays 7.75% to borrow, up from 5.85% a year ago. When money gets pricier at the top, it rarely gets cheaper for Main Street. Line up yours before you need it.
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A Small Price Gap Can End a Sale
A small price gap can end a sale. The most cited reason was a buyer-seller valuation gap.
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Exit Prep Pays Before the Exit
Exit prep pays before the exit. Capstone Partners surveyed 400 owners of privately held middle market companies between May 20 and July 7, 2026.
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Silence Is Not a Succession Plan
Silence is not a succession plan. Only 34.6% of owners have any succession plan. But 58.8% of next-gen respondents assume a plan already exists.
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The "SBA Is Down" Headline Has a Catch
The "SBA is down" headline has a catch. Dollar approvals are down 20.9% compared with FY2025. But FY2025 was a record year.
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Closing the Doors Is the Most Expensive Exit
Closing the doors is the most expensive exit. In the 2026 Zelle Small Business Pulse Report, a survey of 500 small business owners age 50 and up, 41% said they would shut down if they cannot find a buyer.
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27% Have Had a Formal Valuation
27%. That is the share of baby boomer business owners who have had a formal valuation.
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Why Banks Say No to Good Businesses
Only 42% of small firms that applied for financing got the full amount (Federal Reserve Banks, Small Business Credit Survey, March 2026).
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Owners Are Asking. Fewer Are Signing
Owners are asking. Fewer are signing. Calder Capital's Q3 2026 update shares its own activity through Q3: sell-side information requests are up about 7%, valuation work is up 12%, and signed sell-side engagements are down 24%.
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More Deals Does Not Mean Better Prices
More deals does not mean better prices. Nearly half expect the number of businesses sold to rise over the next six months. But 73.9% expect selling prices to stay flat or go down.
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Approved Is Not Funded
Approved is not funded. LenderHawk's 2026 State of SBA Lending, built from SBA public lending data, found that about 1 in 5 SBA 7(a) loans approved in FY2025 never closed.
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Private Equity Is Buying Tire Shops and Landscapers. Know Your Number Before It Calls.
Tire shops. Landscapers. Garage doors. Glass. Those are the businesses on your street.
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The Number One Reason Deals Failed to Close in 2025 Was Not Financing. It Was the Price
The number one reason deals failed to close in 2025 was not financing. It was the price.
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Not Your Multiple. Read the Cash at Close
Not your multiple. Read the cash at close. Salt Creek's 2026 lower middle market outlook does something rare. It translates PE headlines into language founder-owned sellers can actually use.
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Multiples Still Scale with Size. Quality Clears. Uncertainty Waits
Multiples still scale with size. Quality clears. Uncertainty waits. Madison Street Capital's H1 2026 lower middle market note is a useful reality check.
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Under a Year of Planning. Or None
Under a year of planning. Or none. IBBA and M&A Source Market Pulse Q2 2026 surveyed 255 brokers and advisors on deals up to $50M.
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Fewer Deals Closed in Q2. Demand Did Not Leave the Room
Fewer deals closed in Q2. Demand did not leave the room. BizBuySell's Q2 2026 Insight Report shows U.S. business acquisitions down 10% (2,117 closed deals, $1.8B enterprise value).
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Prime at 7%: Three Numbers That Decide If an LOI Survives
On September 16, 2026, the Federal Reserve raised the federal funds target by a quarter point, to a range of 3.75% to 4.00%. The next day, major banks moved prime rates to 7.00%.
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Clarity Before the Gap: The Market Is Open. The Expensive Problem Is the Number.
So the market is not closed. The expensive problem is different.
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The Cost of Opacity: Why Guessing Your Number Before the LOI Is So Expensive
Most Main Street deals do not die because nobody is interested. They die because the number was never clear enough to survive the first hard questions.
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The One Thing Wrong With the Vault Conference
The Vault delivered. The rooms. The list. One thing sat wrong when the lights came down and it does not show up until the end.
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The Vault Conference 2026: Can’t Wait to Meet You
The Vault Conference 2026 is bringing entrepreneurs, investors, and business leaders together in Las Vegas to connect, collaborate, and create new opportunities. Before the conference even begins, the conversations are already proving why getting in the room matters.
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Everyone Agreed Office Real Estate Was Dead. That's Exactly When Smart Money Started Buying.
The gap between the story people are telling and what the data actually shows is, historically, where the most asymmetric returns live.
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America Supplies 70% of the World's Plasma and the Market Is Still Short
In July 2026, the American Red Cross reported blood donations had fallen to a four-year summer low. Hospitals are rationing.
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The Fed Just Signaled Something Every Business Owner Needs to Hear About Their Exit
The single biggest driver of valuation isn't your revenue. It's how dependent the business is on you personally. Buyers price that risk. Most owners don't even know it's a factor until the LOI comes back lower than expected.
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Most Business Owners Have No Idea What Their Company Is Worth
Small business acquisitions are heating up. Deal activity in digital and small business markets jumped 36 percent last year, with six and seven figure transactions increasing 30 percent.
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EIG Launches AI Valuation Platform for Small Business Owners
For years, understanding the value of a small business required expensive advisors, months of preparation, and complicated financial analysis. That barrier is now disappearing.
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Real Lessons in Revenue Design: How Smart Companies Make More Money Without Selling More
Scale or Sell in 2026 gross margin because onboarding costs are absorbing revenue. The solution is not more marketing, it is efficient service delivery and value‑aligned pricing.
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Why the $100M Deals are Just Getting Started
We’re likely to see the next wave of roll-ups focus on sectors where regulation or complexity has historically kept consolidation at bay.
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How Uber Used Membership Economics to Stabilize Growth in a Volatile Economy
Uber insulated itself by building recurring revenue at the core of its model. This is the same defensive-offensive strategy we advocate for Main Street businesses to adapted and scale
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Why Oracle Is Thriving While Others Question the AI Bubble
Small business owners should study this closely, because Oracle is demonstrating a pattern that separates companies that thrive in uncertain markets from those that collapse under pressure.
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Meta Cut $X Billion From The Metaverse… While Sitting on One of the Most Profitable MVPs in the World.
Marketplace could have covered an entire year of Metaverse losses with a single-digit monetization strategy. A Lean Startup strategist would call this “catastrophic misallocation of validated resources.”
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