Starting to feel a bit like 2007 all over again

Times are as good as they’ve been in a while.

As near as our team can recall, the last time we had five different new financings on the go at the same time was the summer of 2007. That was a banner year for Wellington Financial, and we led $87 million in total across 15 different transactions. Once the global financial crisis took hold, that $87 million figure was larger than we’d go on to close in 2008 and 2009 combined — when the world wasn’t sure if we’d be in a recession lasting 3 or 5 years.

At some point in late April of this year we once again hit the “five live financing” mark, with $31.5 million in total capital committed to Innovation companies based five different states and provinces in the USA and Canada. So far, two of those deals have closed, and we’ll be press releasing the details of them shortly (where we can).

The public market backdrop to all of this is interesting. The Dow Jones hit 15,400 for the first time ever this week, up about 3,000 points over the past 12 months. The DJ30 hit a high of 14,000 in the Fall of 2007, which reflected a 3,000 point gain over the prior 15 months or so.

I can’t say the same parallels are seen across the economy. The folks in the Innovation world continue to grow their top line results nicely, but recent hints out of the Canadian banks suggest that other sectors are more stagnant. Mind you, if your banker won’t give you capital to grow your high quality business, don’t get grumpy.

Just give us a call. We’ve got some bandwidth again, and enough capital remaining in our new $200 million Fund IV to help you entrepreneurs tackle your market opportunity.

MRM