Hi John, RE: "the constant federal terrorist warnings have stopped"
Before these warnings in May, the consumers and financial markets were starting to do better in April.
I believe Bush's warnings had a huge psychological impact on consumers and investors in May and June.
The public equities are in the tank, and it seems to have created a negative life of its own. His May negativity has created an uphill battle.
I tend to believe the May warnings made companies much more conservative in their spending patterns. One person I know that has a lot of visibility on many privately held firms (I wonder if large companies will echo this behavior?) said in July, "things were getting better, but then all of a sudden the past two months just turned bad." A different person that has high visibility on a lot of private companies (say 100) said the same, that people were suddenly missing their targets in a huge way. I wonder how dependent large companies are on SMB for revenue? I went to an entrepreneur's party tonight and I didn't meet any new entrepreneurs (I didn't meet any existing ones either.) It's like they're all gone, which is too bad, because now is probably the best time to start a company. Labor is easier to find, money goes further, fewer competitors to be had, etc.
I wonder how a lack of new startups will impact the public companies today and in the future? How much of large co revenues come from small companies? Probably small (?), so my bigger concern is: how will the lack of new companies impact the future, in the way of driving innovation and thus driving future revenues for large public companies? OTOH though one theory says, the outcome of any downturn is innovation thus, more revenue. Microsoft, Cisco, Compaq, and Intel were the result of a previous downturn.
Regards,
Amy J |
