Blog Archives • The Braff Group

Behavioral Health Provider Ideal Option’s Partnership with Safeway: Reflections on an Entire Industry

On June 1st, “Ideal Option, a national leader in evidence-based medication-assisted treatment [announced that it had] partnered with Safeway, one of the largest grocery retailers in the U.S., to provide services to patients inside the store’s wellness center [in] Vancouver, WA”. “With this partnership, Safeway becomes the first national retailer to complement their in-store pharmacy services with an addiction medicine provider – a bold and progressive move that reflects both a decrease in the stigma traditionally surrounding addiction, and the urgency to counter the surge in substance use during the pandemic”.

Valuation as a Meme

Can we finally put to bed the quaint notion that the stock market is even remotely a barometer of the value of a firm based upon its revenues, profits, growth, and risk-return fundamentals? The newest meme stock is AMC Entertainment. You know, the movie theater chain that in the wake of COVID posted more than $1.8B in losses? The company whose future is very much unclear now that the likes of Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, HBO Max, Disney, and others have made first run premiers at home a thing? Yeah, that AMC.

Almost Haven, Messed Dominion

On January 30th, 2018, the Wall Street Journal reported the formation of what would later be called Haven under the headline, Triple Threat: Amazon, Berkshire, JPMorgan Rattle Health-Care Firms “The companies said the venture would be “free from proﬁt-making incentives and constraints” and would develop technological solutions to provide simpliﬁed, high quality health care for their hundreds of thousands of U.S. workers, but they oﬀered few other details [emphasis – and foreshadowing – added]” .

From the Ministry of the Obvious: DoorDash’s IPO is Nuts

How many times have we been here? It’s only been a year since We Work was valued at $47 billion, only to see its value crash land 70% in just 30 days. Now we have DoorDash, one of the companies that won the pandemic. Check out this madness.

Why Valuations May Rise in 2021 – And Why You May Not Care

If you’re in the predictions game and you’re paying attention, you can see that just off in the distance several factors are lining up perfectly to collide in 2021 to propel valuations.

Will a Stay Calm and Carry-on Mindset Beat Back Stubborn COVID Headwinds?

Good question. Glad we asked it. No doubt this is a fluid situation. In fact, given what has transpired in just the past week, our answer today could very well go back to the future in 30 days or so (more on that below). But right now? There is evidence – mostly anecdotal at this point – that the M&A world is beginning to awaken from the Big Sleep.

Will COVID-19 Provide Cover to Corral Value Multiples?

Last summer, we noticed a peculiarly interesting article about what had become a runaway lending environment. Debt capacity had risen as high as 6-7 times EBITDA. What’s more, EBITDA was fast becoming a proforma, go-forward, if-everything-goes-perfect figure. In other words, a substantially puffed up version of the truth that effectively added another 1-2 turns of EBITDA that lenders were willing to put up.

Will Mergers and Acquisitions Multiples Fall as Debt Goes Back to the Future?

Remember the run-up to the global recession when lenders were tripping over themselves to get in on a mergers and acquisitions climate that was positively giddy? When debt capacity, typically expressed as a multiple of a company’s earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization reached milestone levels, eclipsing the “6X barrier” (as coined by PitchBook)? When the term “covenant-lite”, describing loan agreements with fewer protective covenants for the buyer and less restrictions for borrowers, became a thing?

WeWork Didn’t: Are Other Unicorns Taking the Hit?

The saga of WeWork is the stuff of hubris – a financial folly built upon a hope and a dream, financed by a mountain of debt. Once a Google-esque darling of the hyper-hipster Technorati, the office sharing wunderkind saw its valuation tumble from $47 billion to $10 billion to whether it is even viable in the span of a few short months.

Wrangling Deals with Reps and Warranties Insurance

Consider the following from an article published by global insurance giant AON: “2017 and the first half of 2018 posted extraordinary growth in the use of representations and warranties insurance, tax insurance and bespoke contingent...