REPOST: The Accelerators: How to Attract Investors

Business owners can easily raise capital through the help of wealthy investors. Unfortunately, the competition for investor attention can be tough. The Wall Street Journal provides the following advice from experienced entrepreneurs and venture capitalists on attracting investors:  

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Many entrepreneurs find it difficult to navigate the options when it comes to raising capital for their nascent businesses. The competition for investor attention can be fierce.

Twenty-eight percent of business owners who attempted to raise capital last quarter were able to do so from wealthy individual “angel” investors, up from 13% in the second quarter, according to a survey of 2,361 entrepreneurs by Dun & Bradstreet Credibility Corp. and Pepperdine University’s business school that was fielded from July 22 to Aug. 15. Meanwhile, 14% were able to raise venture capital in the third quarter, up from 7% in the year earlier period, the researchers said.

On the Accelerators, a blog on the challenges of starting a business, experienced entrepreneurs and venture capitalists shared tips on attracting investors. Edited excerpts:

Be Confident, Not Needy

Venture investors are well aware of the risks of building billion-dollar companies, much more so than the entrepreneur. Your job is to get them excited about a massive opportunity. Paint the grandest vision for what your business will become. The best thing you can do in a pitch meeting is paint a big vision of something that should seem audacious and even outlandish.

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At the same time, you should try to subtly convey that your deal is going to get done regardless of their investment. Don’t come from a place of need, which we all naturally repel. Create scarcity—let them know that this funding round is closing soon, and that you’re really there to see if you’re the right fit for each other.

Every investor wants to invest in a confident team. Having that certainty helps you walk the line between confident and cocky.

—Jason Nazar, co-founder, Docstoc, Santa Monica, Calif.

Seek Input From a Network

One of the rookie mistakes many first-time entrepreneurs make is to be too guarded about their ideas. Many will actually spend their first $25,000 on patent lawyers without ever fully vetting their product.

The problem is that it’s hard to break through the clutter and get the attention of top investors—they often look only at deals that come in from a credible referral. There’s absolutely nothing more credible than getting an endorsement from a well-known expert who has already put his or her own money into your company.

The only way to create a network like that is by sharing your ideas and seeking input from experts, investors and potential mentors. Most young entrepreneurs overestimate the chances of someone stealing their idea versus the benefits associated with sharing it.

— Scott Weiss, partner at Andreessen Horowitz,
 

Menlo Park, Calif.

Don’t Aim for the Moon

“Valuation sensations”—young entrepreneurs who are worth more than a billion dollars—make great press. 

Like magic, they seem to take ideas out of thin air and turn them into large amounts of money, fast. While, these youthful tycoons pique the imagination, they also distort our understanding of how entrepreneurship works in America.

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The entrepreneurial community and media need to challenge today’s assumption that “real entrepreneurs shoot for the moon and raise big bucks.” Aiming for the moon isn’t how the vast majority of successful entrepreneurs created the bulk of the value in our economy. Let’s also celebrate the entrepreneurs who create value via steady growth and reinvestment of profits.

In the U.S. about five million people every year attempt to become entrepreneurs, according to the Kauffman Foundation. Typically, most funding for startups comes from the founder’s savings, followed by loans on assets such as cars and houses, followed by credit-card debt. But less than 10% of all the funds invested in startups come from outsider equity, Kauffman says.

Venture capitalist Douglas Anderson is skilled in turning financial resources into more profitable assets. Get more tips on business and investing here.

REPOST: China's Stocks Come Back to Life

Although its gains were mostly short-lived and relatively unsubstantial, the Shanghai Composite Index is showing signs of long-term recovery. But because individual traders make up the bulk of the stock trading scene in China, the growth and sustainability of the market will largely anchor on retail investment. Read more about it in the article below:  

Signs are mounting that the recent rally in Chinese stocks isn't a short-term phenomenon. Zuma Press

Image Source: online.wsj.com

Signs are mounting that the recent rally in Chinese stocks—the Shanghai Composite Index has risen for five months in a row—isn't a short-term phenomenon.

After years of poor performance, the benchmark index has advanced 15% this quarter, its biggest quarterly gain since 2009. The rally comes as investors' interest shifts from China's once-hot property sector to stocks.

"China's stock market may be at a turning point," said Jiang Gui, general manager of Shanghai Simpleway Asset Management Co., which manages $100 million in assets.

There have been false starts before. The Shanghai Composite, comprised of yuan-denominated Class A shares, surged 15% in December 2012, creating hopes that the market was coming back to life, but the gains were short-lived. 

This time, with 217,051 new stock accounts opened in the week ending Sept. 19, according to the China Securities Depository and Clearing Corp., the highest level since March 30, 2012, it looks as though investors are willing to give the stock market another chance.

The longevity of the current rally will likely depend on retail investors, since individual traders dominate stock trading in mainland China. 

Eva Zhang, a financial manager in the southwestern city of Chongqing, started buying stocks earlier this year. "I increased my positions in July and August and made money," she said. But Ms. Zhang started to turn cautious on Chinese stocks in mid-September, and has sold part of her holdings since then. 

"I'm getting ready to exit the market once there are signs of an end of the run-up," she said. 

Institutional investors could take a more long-term approach, but China's asset-management industry still plays a relatively small role in a market dominated by retail investors. Yet there are hopes that an influx of foreign funds could help support the next stage of the rally. 

China's domestic stock market has been largely closed off from global capital, but in October a new program connecting the markets in Shanghai and Hong Kong will provide international investors an unprecedented level of access to shares in mainland China. The program, known as Shanghai-Hong Kong Stock Connect, will permit investors in Hong Kong to send as much as 300 billion yuan ($49 billion) into mainland China, allowing mainland investors to buy Hong Kong stocks as well.

The trading link will "allow all, instead of several hundreds of foreign investors to trade A shares. This will enhance the efficiency of the stock market while bringing in unlimited business opportunities for brokers, fund managers and investors," said Yang Xia, head of China equities at UBS Securities. 

Until the advent of Stock Connect, only mainland residents, and foreign institutions that had received purchase quotas from the government, could buy A shares.

The Shanghai Composite has gained nearly 12% so far this year, a sharp turnaround for a market that has performed less well than its global peers since 2010, weighed down by a deteriorating economic outlook. Poorly performing initial public offerings and the availability of better returns in the property market have kept people on the sidelines. 

The benchmark index has yet to fully recover from the turmoil of the global financial crisis in the late 2000s. While other major indexes, such as the Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 index, have reached record highs this year, the Shanghai Composite closed Tuesday at 2363.87, compared with its 2007 peak of 6000 points. 

The rally in Chinese stocks this quarter comes as the country's real-estate market loses its allure. The government has spent years trying gain control of the upward spiral in home prices, and this year the market has finally started to cool. Housing sales were down 10.9% over the first eight months of the year, compared with the same period in 2013.

The stock gains are being helped "by the soft landing in the real-estate market," said Aaron Boesky, the chief executive of Marco Polo Pure Asset Management in Hong Kong, which manages $75 million of assets. "This is exactly what the government wants and it is exactly what the stock market needs."

Douglas Anderson leads a team of financial experts at Wall Street Capital Partners who help clients make the best decisions to grow their money. Visit this website to learn more about strategic investing, mergers, acquisitions, and the stock market.

REPOST: How Kickstarter Turned Into the Venture Capitalist’s Best Friend

When crowdfunding sites like Kickstarter and Indiegogo started, some people believed that it could pose a threat to venture capital as the primary way for technology startups to raise money. However, professional investors quickly found a way to co-opt the trend. Read how they did it in this article from Bloomberg Businessweek.

Image Source: businessweek.com

It turns out that people who are good at raising money through crowdfunding campaigns are also pretty good at raising money from venture capitalists.

 Hardware projects that have raised at least $100,000 through Kickstarter or Indiegogo have gone on to raise $321 million from venture capitalists, according to a report published on Monday by research firm CB Insights. About 9 percent of the 443 projects that reach the $100,000 threshold on the crowdfunding platforms have raised venture capital, too.

When crowdfunding took off, some people believed the idea could pose a threat to venture capital as the prevailing way for technology startups to raise money. Predictably, professional investors quickly found a way to co-opt the trend. Venture capitalists are smart enough to browse the projects on Kickstarter and conclude that the really popular ideas might turn out to be good businesses. “We consider that an extremely helpful data point about whether the public wants a device,” says Peter Moran, a partner at venture firm DCM. The firm hasn’t made any investments in post-Kickstarter investments, but Moran says his colleagues are increasingly attuned to crowdfunding platforms.

Why didn’t crowdfunding, with its more favorable terms, become the alternative to venture capital? It’s really hard to build a gadget company, even if you’ve had success raising money to do so. Prominent Kickstarter projects like the Pebble smartwatch and Ouya gaming console have been overwhelmed by demand, and so both of these crowdfunding darlings turned to venture capital to help reach the scale needed to satisfy their Kickstarter supporters.

Kickstarter itself—launchpad for more than 80 percent of the most successful hardware campaigns—has no problem with veterans of its platform seeking other forms of funding. “Creators maintain total creative freedom to create on their own terms,” wrote Justin Kazmark, a company spokesman, in an e-mail. “For some that might mean staying independent. For others, it might mean taking their project to a bigger stage or working with others.”

There can be a little more ambivalence coming from people whose favorite Kickstarter companies get gobs of venture capital (or worse yet, sell out to a giant social network). Not everyone who backed Oculus VR, the virtual reality headset, was patting its founders on the back when Facebook (FB) paid $2 billion to buy the company. “I think I would have rather bought a few shares of Oculus rather than my now worthless $300 obsolete VR headset,” donor Carlos Schulte wrote on the original Kickstarter page after the acquisition was announced. The sale, of course, was a windfall for the venture capitalists who had invested $91 million in the company. (Bloomberg LP, the parent of Bloomberg Businessweek, is an investor in Andreessen Horowitz, one of Oculus’s investors.) But there was no additional upside for the crowd that backed the idea in the first place.  

This could change if the federal government ever gets around to putting the long-awaited equity crowdfunding rules into place. It wouldn’t necessarily be a better deal for entrepreneurs raising funds—who can now raise millions while holding onto 100 percent of their companies—but it would potentially be better for would-be investors looking to risk their money on long-shot ideas.

In the meantime, crowdfunding platforms exist as either clever forms of market research or clever ways to separate suckers from their money, depending on your point of view.

Douglas Anderson is the CEO of Wall Street Capital Partners, a venture capital firm that assists clients in the rapid expansion of their business through investments, financings, mergers, acquisitions, and dynamic growth strategies. Read more discussions on business and investment here.

REPOST: These investment mistakes will cost you

Investors tend to put money into what has been effective in the past. This is not a foolproof strategy considering the volatility and the rising-rate environment in the investment arena. The article below lists down frequent investing errors and the ways to improve one’s chances of reaching investment success in a volatile world.

Image Source: www.smh.com.au

If you’re making these investment mistakes, you should be running away… fast. 

Drop everything and run when you come across... 

Feelings of certainty. They invariably come just before big surprises. 

People who claim certainty. It's the most potent way to trick someone. 

Risk-free returns. You'll end up with return-free risk. 

People who have predicted 564 of the last two market crashes. And there are a lot of them. 

Adjusting your risk-tolerance when stocks are either crashing or surging. It's the easiest way to make a financial decision you'll regret. 

Putting 30 years’ worth of savings into something you spent seven minutes researching. You have no right to complain about losing money in an investment you put no effort into understanding. 

Extrapolating the recent past into the future. Things always change. If your forecast doesn't, you're doing it wrong. 

People who aren't willing to change their minds. Including yourself. Especially yourself. 

Feeling smarter after the market goes up. You had nothing to do with it. 

Explanations of what were likely random events. This means almost every market move that takes place in time periods less than one year. 

Having political feelings within ten miles of your investment decisions. This is a common way smart people make dumb decisions with money. 

Spending more time arguing why other investors are wrong than trying to figure out what you're doing wrong. 

Spending the majority of your time in a job you hate in order to make enough money to spend part of your time in a life you don't hate. 

Precision. Finance just doesn't work that way. 

Impatience. It's the fastest way to disappointment. The opposite is <Warren Buffett> (http://www.fool.com.au/2014/07/22/keep-investing-simple/) 

Investments you can't explain to a third grader. If you can't, you probably have no idea what you're getting into. 

Assuming your past investing behaviour isn't indicative of your future behaviour. It's the best guide you have. 

Assuming that the random life experiences you've had provide a complete view of the world. Everyone has their own version of history and it's a tiny reflection of reality. 

Reliance on pensions, inheritances, or the decisions of anyone other than yourself to make it through retirement. Few third parties care about your wellbeing decades from now. 

Assuming investors who wear suits are smarter than you. Being a smart investor has little to do with education or job title and everything to do with behavioural traits. 

Assuming intelligence in one field translates to being a smart investor. I doubt there's any correlation. 

Assuming that bad investments you made were the result of bad luck and good investments you made were all skill. 

Measuring investment fees in basis points instead of dollars. An adviser saying, "My fee is 100 basis points" sounds so much better than, "This will cost you $35,000 per year." 

Feeling entitled to investment returns, a decent job, or predictability. 

Trading on margin. Most people can't handle market volatility without leverage. 

Trading, in general. You're fighting randomness and computers that can solve a trillion problems before you can blink. 

Worrying about things you can't control. Like what the RBA will do next, what the market will do next month, or whether earnings will beat expectations. 

Avoid those, and most everything else should fall into place. 

Investors, you can discover 2 ASX stocks Warren Buffett could love. Simply click here to claim your free copy of The Motley Fool’s new report “Warren Buffett’s Greatest Wisdom—Plus 2 ASX Shares Buffett Could Love.”

Douglas Anderson assists clients in seeking rapid expansion and mitigating risk through investments, financings, mergers, acquisitions and other dynamic financial growth strategies. Go here for more information about Mr. Anderson’s role as the CEO of Wall Street Capital Partners and founder of Diego Pellicer Inc.

REPOST: The Challenge Of Investing In Today's Market

Is today’s market one of the most challenging for investors? This Forbes article chronicles some of the most turbulent investment periods in recent history and explains how these past scenarios depict the future of investing.

Intro

Never before in America have we witnessed government debt at this level and a monetary expansion so great. How did we arrive at this juncture? Where does this road lead? How has it affected the financial markets? This may well be one of the most challenging investment climates in modern history. To put this into proper perspective, we’ll need to go back to the 1930s and The Great Depression.

Image source: moneyunder30.com

1934: The Great Depression

After more than a third of all U.S. banks folded between 1929 and 1933, the federal government intervened. You can actually trace the recent housing crisis back to the National Housing Act of 1934, which established the Federal Housing Administration (FHA). Back then, racial discrimination and segregation were common. A year later, in 1935, the Federal Home Loan Bank Board (FHLBB) asked the Homeowners Loan Corporation (HOLC) to survey 239 cities and determine which areas carried a greater risk of loan default. As a result, many minority communities were deemed ineligible to receive loans. This was a significant factor of inner city decay as it caused an exodus of businesses and individuals, leaving buildings abandoned, which eventually became a magnet for illegal activities such as drugs and other practices.

In the 1960s, a sociologist named John McKnight coined the phrase redlining to describe the practice. In essence, a line was drawn around areas deemed to be higher risk for lenders, insurance providers, and other services. But compassion would prevail.

1977: The Federal Government Gets Involved

During the Carter administration, the Community Reinvestment Act of 1977 (CRA) was passed to help alleviate the problem of discrimination and make home ownership more attainable for minorities. However, this was a law without teeth. Then, in the 1990s, during the Clinton administration, the law was amended and for the first time punitive measures were added. Basically, lenders were required to make a certain percentage of their loans in these underprivileged areas. This expanded the number of potential home buyers and set the stage for one of the most catastrophic financial events in modern U.S. history, the housing bubble. The CRA was fully embraced by the Bush administration and by 2006, the peak of U.S. home prices, the ratio of median home prices to median income had risen from its historic norm of approximately 3:1 to almost 5:1. In other words, home prices were growing at a much faster pace than incomes. There were many others who were complicit in the 2008 crisis, including rating agencies, mortgage bankers, brokerage firms, and others. To avoid a more serious crisis, the Fed began its unprecedented expansion of the money supply, first with T.A.R.P. (Dec 2008 to Aug 2010), then QE II (Nov 2010 to June 2011), Operation Twist (Sept 2011), and finally QE III (Sept 2012 to present). Our national debt has almost doubled since 2008, standing at over $17.5 trillion today. To be clear, without T.A.R.P., we may have experienced another depression. However, the real consequences of the Fed’s actions have yet to be seen, as it will eventually have to change course and tighten monetary policy (i.e.; raise interest rates and reduce the money supply). Why has the Fed embarked on such an aggressive policy?

Image source: telegraph.co.uk

The Fed & The Wealth Effect

The Fed is charged by Congress with two primary goals. They are: 1) full employment; and 2) stable prices. To clarify, full employment is an unemployment rate less than 4.0% to 5.0% (approx). Stable prices relate to the Fed’s inflation target which is around 2.0%. However, since our economy is measured by its GDP (gross domestic product), and since 67-70% of GDP is based on consumer spending, the consumer is clearly the most important part of the equation. To encourage consumer spending, the Fed has engaged in a type of psychological warfare, which is referred to as the wealth effect. Here’s how it works. Consumers have a choice as it pertains to their money; they can spend it or save it. The Fed is hoping they will spend it and is acting accordingly. How? First, the Fed reduced short-term interest rates to near zero, which made savings accounts very unpalatable. However, individuals could still invest in bonds. Bonds are greatly affected by changes in interest rates. For example, when interest rates rise, bond prices fall and bond investors lose principal (at least on paper). In 2013, the rate on the 10 year U.S. Treasury rose about 1.09% in only 65 days! This caused great concern among bond investors. As a result, a large amount of bonds were sold as prices fell. This also made investors wary of bonds as they believed interest rates might continue to rise. That leaves stocks. In short, the Fed has been trying to push investors into stocks for several years. Why? Because if enough investors do this, it will increase demand for stocks, which will help push stock prices higher. This is precisely what has happened. When the stock market rises, investors feel wealthier and tend to spend more (in the aggregate). That’s how the wealth effect works. Has it been successful? Well, stocks have certainly risen far beyond the expectations of institutional investors, hedge fund managers, etc. In fact, this prolonged rise, from an historic perspective, has been longer than most bull markets. It’s been referred to as “climbing the wall of worry.” Why? Because of the belief that the other shoe could drop at any time. The consensus view is that stocks have risen primarily because of Fed policy. In other words, when the Fed changes direction and discontinues its monetary expansion and raises interest rates, stock investors will need a very large parachute as prices are expected to plummet. Contrary to historic norms, stocks continue to rise despite a negative 1.0% GDP during the first quarter of 2014. Although most economists blame the economic contraction on the harsh winter weather, and perhaps that’s correct, one more quarter of negative GDP would result in a textbook definition of a recession. And recessions are not good for stocks. However, most do not believe the second quarter GDP will be negative. Whatever the case, cash is out, bonds are risky if rates rise, and stocks are in a potential bubble. We all know what eventually happens to bubbles.

Image source: turner.com

Conclusion

Is this one of the most challenging periods for investors in the modern era? A recent survey of advisors indicated that portfolio management is the most concerning issue today. It’s certainly not a time to leave your portfolio unattended, as another precipitous fall in stock prices may be lurking just around the corner. After all, any significant political or social event, a natural disaster, or even a change in Fed policy could easily cause panic and a significant correction. Stay tuned as we continue to watch this story unfold.

Douglas Anderson, the current CEO of Wall Street Capital Partners and founder and co-chair of several organizations including Diego Pellicer Inc., has witnessed some of stormiest and the greatest moments in the investment world. Subscribe to this Facebook page for similar stories on investment and finance.

REPOST: From Andreessen, a Lesson in Corporate Finance

Tweeting his tips about investments and technology valuations, renowned venture capitalist Marc Andreesen provided handy lessons on finance. Read some of his tweets in this article from The New York Times.  

Marc Andreessen, a venture capitalist on the board of Facebook, offered a
peek at how Silicon Valley values companies.
Image Source: nytimes.com

The valuations of highflying technology companies can seem baffling to those not initiated in the ways of Silicon Valley. 

Deals like Facebook’s $16 billion purchase of WhatsApp, a company that makes very little money, or its $2 billion acquisition of Oculus VR, a start-up that has not yet shipped a product to the public, can make a Wall Street banker’s head spin. 

But mergers and acquisitions in technology follow a different set of rules, according to Marc Andreessen, a prominent venture capitalist who happens to sit on Facebook’s board. In a series of tweets on Thursday, Mr. Andreessen offered a framework for thinking about technology valuations — relying on metrics that hard-nosed financiers tend not to consider.

Here is a selection of his tweets.

Douglas Anderson is the CEO of Wall Street Capital Partners. Highly skilled in the various aspects of corporate finance, private equity, and venture capital, he founded and co-chairs several other companies, including Diego Pellicer Inc. For more articles about finance, follow this Twitter page.

REPOST: Investment Fees: Don’t Let Them Get You

Every type of investment, whether real estate or an index mutual fund, requires some forms of fees; learning their exact cost and purpose is crucial to the investment's overall financial health.

Image source: foxnews.com

Investments come in many shapes and sizes, and so do the fees that are associated with them.

New regulations require fees to be more prominently disclosed, but many Americans still have no idea how much of their money is being invested and how much goes to cover administrative costs.

“People are pretty knowledgeable about the fees that are transparent like investment management fees and transaction fees,” says Chris Cook, founder and president of Zero Commission Portfolios. “Where I see lots of clients over paying is on those fees that are buried away.”

The amount to fees varies with investment type. Typically, passive investments like an index mutual fund or vehicles that don’t require a person to actively manage the money come with lower fees.

While people can choose passive investments in their retirement funds, many 401(k) s are actively managed. According to FeeX, www.feex.com, a new website trying to create more transparency around fees, 7 in 10 Americans think their 401(k)s don’t have any fees. In reality, the company claims workers lose $155,000 in fees over the course of their career. What’s more, in 2012, the amount of money spent on financial services fees was $600 billion, with $100 billion coming from mutual funds and $35 billion stemming from 401(k)s.

“As consumers who are paying, we should know exactly what the cost is,” says Yoav Zurek, chief executive of FeeX. “If you buy a TV, you know the price for that TV in dollars” and it should be the same with investment fees.

There are all sorts of fees investors get hit with from commissions when working with a stock broker. Regardless of the type of fees, W. Kirk Taylor, chief investment strategist at 1St Portfolio Wealth Advisors, fees associated with a passive fund like an exchange traded fund should be somewhere in the 25 basis points or the one-quarter of 1% range.

Some funds can carry fees as low as 5 basis points while more popular investments can charge fees of as high as 50 to 60 basis points, on average, he says.

For actively-managed investments, Taylor says the fees, on average, tend to be around 1.5% of the investment amount. “In general, lower fees translate into higher returns. Active managers can add value during certain market conditions but investors should recognize that for an actively managed mutual fund the manager has to generate a 1.5% return before his or her shareholders make any money whatsoever.”

Although investment firms have to disclose their fees, investors have to be their own advocate and ask about them and make sure they understand how much of their money is covering these costs. It’s pretty unlikely that a mutual fund company is going to offer up the number without being prodded.

Combing through a prospectus can also find the answer, but it can get pretty complex. Experts say a mutual fund provider should be willing to provide the answer. “The fees are listed in the prospectus, but they are not really easy to understand,” says Cook, pointing to the expense ratio fee as an example. Investors don’t see that fee deducted on their statement every month, yet Cook says that’s probably the largest fee they are paying. The expense ratio is the percentage of the fund’s assets that are used to run the mutual fund.

Cook advises investors understand all the fees and whether it’s actively or passively managed before making an investment. This information is particularly important because a highly active fund can bring hefty fees.

“Investors really have to be an advocate for themselves,” he says. “They have to do their due diligence and ask for every possible fee. You want to know what the management fee is, if there is a financial planning fee for coordinating the account, and the transaction fees.”

Douglas Anderson is a financial expert who founded Diego Pellicer Inc. and currently serves as CEO of Wall Street Capital Partners. Visit this website to know more about his professional activities.

Right on the money: Choosing a banker

The financial meltdown plus grim portrayals of the financial classes in TV and movies have put investment bankers under intense public scrutiny. Nonetheless, running perceptions about them fail reality. Sensationalized media portrayals gloss over the positive: Most of these financiers are driven, hardworking professionals who are no different from their counterparts in other fields.

 

Image Source: centuryproductsllc.com

Investment bankers, however, are still toeing caution. And no one can blame them, especially as they deal with large sums of money. When choosing an investment banker to work with, what do clients need to consider? Inc. listed five important qualities of effective investment bankers:  

Experience -- Successfully handling million-dollar deals is not a skill learned overnight. It takes time to build networks, properly execute deals, and maximize questions. Some of the questions clients can ask the would-be banker include, “How many deals have you successfully closed?” and “What was the value of those deals?”  

 

Image Source: yomistablogspotcom

Tenacity -- Not to be confused with ruthlessness, tenacity is what drives investment bankers to close deals successfully. Tenacious bankers fully understand the goals of their clients and are focused and determined in achieving those. Always armed with a back-up plan in case initial negotiation fails, these bankers value hard work and dedication.

 

Image Source: telegraph.co.uk

Financial industry veterans tip off clients on the red flags about investment bankers, too. After all, picking the right investment banker determines the lifeline of a business.  

As a long-time investment banker, Douglas Anderson, Diego Pellicer Inc. founder and current CEO of Wall Street Capital Partners has seen how spotting financial growth opportunities for clients is a business gamechanger. After a successful underwriting career, he started his own investment banking firm in 1998 where he had the opportunity to work on several deals across various industries. Click here to read more about his career achievements.