Marin McElhany to Attend ACG San Francisco Banking Breakfast

Next week, our very own Marin McElhany will represent the team at US Capital Partners and attend the Association for Corporate Growth's Monthly Breakfast Event Series.

The event takes place on Tuesday, February 7th at The City Club located in downtown San Francisco. The theme of this month's breakfast is "Boring Bay Area Banks Bring Home the Bacon." The ACG event will feature two CEO's, Russell A. Colombo and  John E. Rossell III, who will share how they managed to steadily grow net income, deposits and their loan portfolios the last several years by sticking to the basics of banking - by taking deposits and lending to middle-market companies.

US Capital Partners serves as a direct lender, co-lender and lead financial arranger private and public companies with $5 million to $100 million in sales. If you would like to know more about how your business can secure the funding it needs, contact Marin McElhany, Vice President of Sales and Marketing, at marin@uscapitalpartners.net or call (415) 889-1010. 

Occupy Wall Street: Its Impact on Banks and Credit Unions

Occupy Wall Street (OWS)Ever since Occupy Wall Street began life last September in Manhattan’s Zuccotti Park, it has sought to spark a national debate on our economic system and the way its spoils are divided. As an investment banker and small business lender, I am often asked about the movement and its impact on banks and credit unions. Here are my thoughts on some of the questions I get asked most often:

  

Has anything changed since Occupy Wall Street first began?

Smaller banks and commercial finance groups are starting to speak up about bad service and unfair competition from the bailed-out (“too-big-to-fail”) banks and about how inefficient they are. Also, I believe the reversal on debit card fees is a direct result of Occupy Wall Street, which helped fuel the consumer backlash. The protests and media coverage certainly amplified concerns and heightened the conversation. It’s a claimable victory for Occupy Wall Street.

Have smaller community banks and credit unions benefited through customers moving their money out of the large Wall Street banks?

 
Smaller banks may have benefited in increased deposit relationships at the beginning.

Have bank customers become more polarized?

 
Absolutely. Occupy Wall Street needs a bit more direction and few bullet point issues to rally around. In the early stages, the movement was driven by a general feeling of malaise, but as time goes by there will likely be a rallying around a few key issues. This is when the movement will really gain momentum. Whoever strikes the note will emerge as a thought leader in the space.

Have lawmakers listened, and if so, what are they saying in an election year?

 
Nothing. They are still clueless and afraid.

In this instance, is social media’s bark bigger than its bite?

 
I don’t think so. Wait for the weather to get better in spring and summer of 2012. The movement will explode, and social media will prove to be a potent rallying force in its support.

Keep in touch with the team at US Capital Partners: Tweet us at @smallbizlending and share your thoughts on Occupy Wall Street (OWS).

It’s Time to Break Up the Bigger Government-Supported Banks

According to The Wall Street Journal, “Smaller U.S. banks and savings institutions are cutting jobs in a sign of a deepening financial-industry retrenchment that is shaking firms from Main Street to Wall Street.” More than 2,500 banks cut their work forces in the third quarter of 2011, reducing their staff by a combined 20,332 jobs, or 2.5%.

Small community banks are, of course, the lifeblood of small businesses. This is therefore a worrying development, with the potential to sink the U.S. economy into a second recession, if not properly addressed. It’s high time we broke up some of the bigger government-supported banks and better regulated their product offerings, which have become too diversified and create systemic risk. More smaller banks obviates the “too big to fail” conundrum. This then breathes life into the smaller regional banks, which are closer to their communities and borrowers and are better able to evaluate financing realistically.

Large government-supported regional branches of behemoth banks run by 18-year-old, high-school graduate “store managers” (or in the words of The Wall Street Journal, “straight-out-of-college branch-manager trainees”) are not going to make intelligent credit decisions and loans to smaller businesses in need. They are going to err on the side of conservative formulaic lending, which is choking off credit. As a model of success, look at asset-based lenders—a diversified, fragmented group of small commercial lenders in excellent financial condition that continues to lend to smaller businesses despite the ongoing constriction in small business lending by the bigger banks.

Letting Go of Wall Street - My Response

Rasanath Das, in blue sweater, in a group meditation at Occupy Wall Street in Zuccotti Park. Photo by Philip Montgomery for The Wall Street Journal.The Wall Street Journal published an article last week entitled “Letting Go of Wall Street.” It features Rasanath Das, a 32-year-old MBA who previously earned a $170,000 salary working long days negotiating deals at Bank of America. Choosing to eschew materialism and devote himself entirely to spirituality, Rasanath Das resigned as an investment banker to lead the life of a full-fledged Hindu monk.

Over the past year, however, Mr. Das has been invited by bankers to speak on the subject of mindfulness and the market. Because of his Cornell University MBA and years in the industry, bankers can relate to Mr. Das, whose talks recount his career trajectory in finance and his eventual choice to leave it.

I decided to post a comment.

My Response to the Article

The “spiritual” aspect of the service Mr. Rasanath Das performs, as it relates to business, may be difficult for most of us to get our heads around. Not that there isn’t value there. I am merely acknowledging the challenge. Perhaps an easier concept to grasp is the important difference between providing “service” to all parties to a transaction in business for remuneration and merely engaging in “self-service,” where the transaction benefits certain parties disproportionately, especially the provider. I believe it is this ethos of self-service that is the root cause of the current problems we have in “big” business, and which is sparking this particular “revolt” that I believe is merely in its nascent stages.

The solution may be to go to a more value-added and transparent service model for larger businesses, much like the model successful small businesses provide.

Recent Refinancing and Financial Advisory Transactions

Our work at US Capital Partners is to secure the best possible financing for our clients. Our services include direct lending and specialist advisory. We serve as direct lender, co-lender, and lead financial arranger with investment banking and lending solutions for small-to-middle market companies.

Recently we engineered a $2.8 Million refinancing for a Tennessee based printing and manufacturing business. Our team evaluated the business's collateral coverage and financial performance, we helped arrange a partial take-out of the bank at a significant discount. The family-run business has managed to retain its staff and is growing stronger with lower debt, and a better relationship with a new lender.

Below are some of our most recent transactions. Click for details or visit our Recent Transactions page.

If you'd like to know more about how US Capital Partners can support you with financing solutions, call us (415) 889-1010 or visit www.uscapitalpartners.net