Insights
Written for CFOs, audit teams, attorneys, and referral partners, not for search engines. Long-form Insights analyze recent rulings, methodology shifts, and second-order effects. Field guides answer the practical questions referral partners and prospective clients ask most often.
Insights
7 articles
May 2026 · 10 min read
In 18 months, OpenAI was “valued” at $157 billion, $300 billion, $500 billion, and $852 billion, through a primary, a structured round, an employee tender, and a recapitalization. Backsolve still works, but the era when it could work casually is over.
Apr 2026 · 9 min read
A small change in volatility moves indicated value materially. That is why the line between “judgment” and “value management” gets watched so closely, and why the most expensive mistake is the one that was never explained.
Mar 2026 · 10 min read
OBBBA raised the federal estate-tax exemption to $15 million per person. It didn’t repeal the rules that decide whether a discount survives review. Two recent cases, one from the Supreme Court and one from the Tax Court, show why the work matters more, not less.
Feb 2026 · 10 min read
In growth-company equity valuation, OPM versus PWERM versus Monte Carlo isn’t really the question. The AICPA’s December 2025 working draft makes that explicit, and the secondary market is forcing the issue.
Jan 2026 · 11 min read
A mixed-asset PPA isn’t five reports stapled together. The audit comments come where the workstreams fail to reconcile, and the PCAOB’s 2025 inspection findings show where firms keep getting it wrong.
Dec 2025 · 9 min read
Olympic turned on the answer to a question that came earlier in the assignment. Most appraisal disputes do.
Nov 2025 · 10 min read
The California Supreme Court’s August ruling didn’t make general headlines, but for hotels, healthcare, senior housing, and any other operating real estate where intangibles run alongside the building, it changed the standard of proof.
Field guides
15 guides
Sep 2026
Before the first option grant, the regulation requires a fair market value conclusion that holds up. What that means in practice, and where the cheap-and-fast version stops working.
Sep 2026
The same company on the same date can carry two different numbers without the math being broken. Preferred and common are different securities, and the rights stack above common stock is doing what it was negotiated to do.
Sep 2026
Two offers with the same headline can produce very different seller proceeds, because the structure matters more than the multiple. Modeling the deal economics before signing the LOI is what separates strong negotiations from disappointing closings.
Sep 2026
The number that matters depends on what someone will actually pay, given cash flow, transferability, intangible value, debt, and any real estate tied to operations. There’s a defensible range, not a single right answer.
Sep 2026
The price moves with five things: why the work is being done, who relies on the report, how complex the company is, how much support the conclusion requires, and whether the IRS, an SBA lender, a court, or an auditor will read it.
Sep 2026
The number serves three purposes: estate-tax filing, basis step-up, and estate administration. Each pulls in a slightly different direction, and the IRS examination program reviews these filings closely.
Sep 2026
Rather than pricing a company in the abstract, the expert analyzes how the business operates, which earnings are economic, which adjustments are legitimate, whether goodwill is enterprise or personal, and how related-party real estate affects the answer.
Sep 2026
Most valuation delays happen because the work started before the right records were assembled. The request list changes with the asset, the interest, the date, and the purpose, and so does what “ready to start” means.
Sep 2026
The right question is rarely what the company is worth. It is what value the agreement or governing law requires, for what interest, on what date, and with what assumptions, and the standard of value alone can change the answer by 25–40%.
Sep 2026
For most informal purposes, the company is one asset. For SBA loans, federal financing, ASC 805 allocations, estate planning, divorce, partner buyouts, and property-tax appeals, the components have to be valued under their respective standards.
Sep 2026
An assessment appeal is a value dispute, not a tax-bill complaint. For income-producing, special-purpose, or operationally complex properties, the question is whether the assessor’s mass-appraisal model captures the facts of the property, and whether the evidence can show that it did not.
Sep 2026
Taxpayers often use the word appraisal loosely, and the IRS does not. The qualified-appraisal rules govern who can sign, what content is required, and what timing applies, and a technically defective appraisal can disqualify the deduction even when the underlying value is correct.
Sep 2026
Under SBA SOP 50 10 Version 8, the lender orders the valuation, not the buyer or seller. The $250,000 threshold, the close-party rule, and the special-purpose property requirements determine what credentialing applies. Closings stall when the valuation doesn’t fit the deal.
Sep 2026
Hotels, senior housing, healthcare campuses, gas stations, car washes, restaurants, and industrial facilities don’t fit a standard CRE template. The question is what specifically is being valued, under what standard, for what purpose.
Sep 2026
Buyers don’t pay for your effort, your retirement goal, or the amount you need. They pay for transferable future cash flow and the durability of the story behind it. Knowing the gap between asking price and supportable value before going to market is what changes the outcome at closing.
If a recurring question in your practice would be useful as a Field note, send a one-liner. Some of the best topics come from inbound questions.