Lucky 7
The SBA-administered New Markets Venture Capital Program, a
dollar-for-dollar matching program, has conditionally approved
seven firms investing in economically depressed areas: Athens,
Ohio-based Adena Ventures; Wiscasset, Maine-based CEI Community
Ventures Fund LLC; College Park, Maryland-based Dingman Center for
Entrepreneurship; Philadelphia-based Murex Investments I LP;
University, Pennsylvania-based Pennsylvania Rural Opportunities
Fund; Oak Ridge, Tennessee-based The Southern Appalachian Fund LP;
and Phoenix-based Southwest Development Fund LLC.
Funds must meet the program's January 9, 2002, deadline for
raising at least $5 million in equity investment funds and an
additional 30 percent of that total in technical assistance grant
money, but it's not too early to make advances. "Since we
received conditional approval, we essentially began
operating," says Lynn Gellermann, president and COO of Adena
Ventures, which has already raised $12.5 million-plus in equity
funds.
Content Continues Below
A second round of approvals is planned for spring 2002.
Duty Calls
Announced in the wake of the September terrorist attacks, the
SBA's Military Reservist Economic Injury Disaster Loan program
(MREIDL) was eerily well-timed. The program, which offers support
for companies that have key employees called to active duty,
debuted just days after an announcement that an expected 35,500
reservists would be called in the coming months.
53%
of Americans say they are not in a good
position to spend money.
SOURCE: The Gallup
Organization
|
Yet MREIDL was two years in the making, following the Veterans
Entrepreneurship and Small Business Development Act of 1999 after
the Bosnian conflict. Affected businesses can apply for up to $1.5
million at a maximum interest rate of 4 percent and a term of up to
30 years, says the SBA's Carol Chastang. "The idea is to
help keep small businesses, which can be devastated by the loss of
a key person, alive during that period."
Companies can apply for a MREIDL by filing an application with
their regional SBA disaster area office anytime up until 90 days
after the employee is discharged, says Chastang. "The business
essentially has to prove that a key employee was called up for an
extended period of time for a military conflict and that the
business suffered economic loss because that employee or business
owner was away."
Play With the Pros
Once the exclusive domain of professionals, a mind-dazzling
array of stock data-share price, P/E ratio, revenue growth-is
available in real time to individuals via the Internet. And the
online stock-picking tools you can use to crunch these numbers are
more sophisticated than ever. Sites like www.tradeworx.com,
www.valuengine.com and www.vectorvest.com
lure investors with free stock-screening tools, then soft-sell
premium subscription-based services promising professional-quality
analysis uncolored by the biases associated with brokerage
firms.
Is stepping up to the next level worth the monthly fees, which
typically range from $9.95 to $49.95? It depends on the service and
the investor's needs, says Borzou Deragahi, who covers personal
finance for Money magazine. "If you want to find a fair
value for a stock, there are plenty of Web sites out there that
charge for that, but you can get similar analysis for free,"
he says. Free services like www.morningstar.com, www.quicken.com and
www.valuepro.net may not give you the specific details
you need, though. In that case, you may have to pay for extra info.
Tradeworx, for example, offers a service for $9.95 per month geared
to investors who place limit orders. It lets you enter the stock
and the price you want to pay, and analyzes real-time historic
price data to calculate the odds of execution over the next five
days.
In general, however, be wary of fee-based sites, advises
Deragahi. "Unless you're looking for something really
specialized, you can find a free equivalent."
Jennifer Pellet is a
freelance writer in New York City specializing in business and
finance.