Key Takeaways from the Q2 2019 Private Capital Access Index

The latest Private Capital Access Index, published quarterly by Pepperdine Graziado Business School, was released recently, and with it came fresh insights into the minds of business owners. Covering companies that earn under $5 million in revenue annually, as well as those that raise between $5-100 million, the Index provides information on a wide range of business. Below are snapshots of some of the main points found within the report:

More Large Businesses Appear to be Looking for More Money

Businesses that earn between $5-100 million a year are seeking to raise more financing in 2019. Compared to 2018, many loan ranges have seen jumps: the amount of larger businesses seeking between $500,000-999,999 has over doubled in size to 39% and $1-1.999 million has more than tripled to 28%. However, outside of this range, desire has fallen for financing among larger firms.

Slight Fluctuations in How Quickly Customers Are Paying

The past year has witnessed some small changes in the speed at which businesses receive payments from their customers. With 15% of smaller businesses reporting accelerated reception of payments in the previous three months, an increase from the 11% that was stated this time last year, and an increase of 1% of larger businesses claiming a speed up, it seems at least that a small sector of fortunate vendors are benefitting from increasingly prompt customers.

Accompanying these figures are the reports of payments slowing down, that show a 2% increase amongst smaller companies and a drop to 10% from 23% for their larger counterparts. This jump is accounted for by the 81% of larger businesses which reported that the speed of payments remained the same, which is up from 70%; while the smaller firms reported 63%, down from 68% in 2018.

More Businesses Are Planning to Raise Finance

More businesses of all sizes are looking to raise capital in the coming six months compared to 2018, with 35% of small businesses and 28% of larger businesses claiming that they will be seeking financing, an increase of 5% for both. This news, coupled with the knowledge that the total number of businesses which said they will not be seeking finance dropped, may come as a gift to lenders and brokers, but it should be taken with a pinch of salt, as those who said they were unsure also rose by 4% to 35%.

Purposes for Raising Finance Remain Mostly Unchanged

Growth and expansion continue to be the primary reason for seeking finance, with an increase on last year from 58% for both the smaller and larger companies to 62% and 77%, respectively. As well as this, working capital fluctuations and refinancing existing loans/equity remain as the second and third highest reasons to raise funds, with the total of the former dropping 3% to 17% and the latter falling to 7% from 10%. Besides these motives, capital required to replace equipment or facilities unrelated to expansion saw a dip of 4% in larger businesses.

Businesses Are Optimistic

Despite over 50% of businesses saying that it is difficult to acquire both equity and debt finance, as well as 49% claiming that the current business financing environment restricts growth opportunities, businesses appear to be confident about the future, with 68% of them expecting increases in revenue over the next year. Also, respondents appear to be unconcerned by external forces, as 57% of businesses don’t believe the federal tax hike will impact them and 74% don’t expect to be hampered by severe weather from climate change. These may or may not prove to be naïve as time goes on, especially the latter, as 56% of the respondents do not have emergency funds in place should severe weather disrupt their business, but for now companies seem to be looking forward to the coming year.

The full report is available here.

Brendan Garrett was a Reporter at deBanked.