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Ex-IB + large-cap PE. Acquiring high quality businesses - closed my first solo platform acquisition, a regional branded chain of bars (15 units) in Feb '25

[X @EquityHaze]

Left my large-cap PE gig in Feb ‘24, post-bulge bracket IB, to hunt small biz deals. One year later, closed my 1st: a 20-location bar chain (w/ food). Reviewed dozens of deals, had 4 LOIs—3 flopped. Now chronicling ops, strategy, finance & deal-making. Follow along!

[X @EquityHaze]

Great idea! Dog Drop is one of the most compelling franchise concepts I’ve come across… I’ve dropped my dogs at a couple of them while traveling and had a great experience. In fact, my family opted to go to Disney Land instead of Disney World because we knew there is a Dog Drop location in Anaheim!

[X @EquityHaze]

@paulswaney3 You had me at Consigliere

[X @EquityHaze]

@paulswaney3 Would love to see the materials!

[X @EquityHaze]

@JJWatt Chuck a Rama?

[X @EquityHaze]

@dealflow_guy How do lenders finance deals like this when the marketed EBITDA is so far off from real operating cash flows?

Wouldn’t that expose these shenanigans? Or do SBA lenders not catch it?

[X @EquityHaze]

@Polymarket @grok

How much of a reduction in total food and beverage deliveries did this represent?

[X @EquityHaze]

@A_LastingLegacy I’d take a look!

[X @EquityHaze]

@JJWatt how does one contact you about a business opportunity? My partner and I are working on a deal we think you’d love to be involved with.

[X @EquityHaze]

@MikeBotkin_ What do you mean you could not get traction / momentum? From investors?

[X @EquityHaze]

how are these small deals with super high multiples financed? Are they very over equitized?

Any time I look at a small-ish deal that trades for anything above 5x, I can't get comfortable enough with the FCF to put any sort of meaningful leverage on it. The cash flow is so fragile

[X @EquityHaze]

@TheSalonDon I have my mortgage bet on this 🙏

[X @EquityHaze]

@sourcesandmuses I got pitched a septic roll up last week… platform was $1.5mm of adjusted EBITDA for 7.5x…

Crazy, who would pay 7.5x for that shit (no pun intended)!

[X @EquityHaze]

@TheSalonDon Does she get a free tanning subscription?

[X @EquityHaze]

@TheSalonDon Bloom energy was my client in IB…. Mkt cap was $800mm, now it’s ~$60bn

The executive team is all worth over $200mm, with the founder being worth $5bn

[X @EquityHaze]

@TheSalonDon Same here, except I don’t understand the fundamentals of finance 😂

[X @EquityHaze]

@shainadenny @AlexForbesOps Franchise Systems AI is incredible... founded by the team behind Pepper Lunch... it's basically a full operating suite for franchisors and multi-site businesses

[X @EquityHaze]

@Will_Schryver Brian Moynihan is terrible… BofAs corporate and commercial lending business run on autopilot… he doesn’t understand risk or how to allocate capital.

The hold to maturity mess is one of the worst mishaps in the last 15 years

[X @EquityHaze]

@PadraicMcC Many independent sponsors are overly incentivized to close deals regardless of quality / price bc the deal fee and management fee are life changing amounts for them

[X @EquityHaze]

I think Elon's companies have received in total about $38bn in subsidies (largely democrat led, climate change / EV subsidies) while there is $18bn in cumulative fraud that's been identified since 2018 in Minnesota alone...

What's been a better use of capital? Pretty easy to conclude that helping Elon innovate has been a high ROI investment relative to the alternative uses of that capital.

[X @EquityHaze]

To some degree, you want the CEO of an aggregator platform to think as a capital allocator. The sort of philosophy displayed in the Outsiders (Thorndike)... CEO focuses 90% of time on capital allocation, while hiring elite operators, allowing them to operate in a decentralized manner with close to full autonomy, and incentivizing them aggressively