New York City-based financial executive Kate Merli provides leadership to New 2nd Capital as the firm’s chief financial officer. Away from her work, Kate Merli stays active by hiking.During any type of physical activity, your heart pumps faster to deliver the blood and oxygen your muscles need to work efficiently. Without enough oxygen, your muscles feel tired. This often occurs if you aren’t breathing properly when hiking.To avoid this issue, decide whether breathing through your nose or your mouth works best for you. Typically, inhaling through the mouth and exhaling through the nose is the most efficient way of getting the air your body needs. However, breathing in through the nose and out through the mouth filters small bugs and particles from the air.After you choose your preferred breathing method, focus on breathing at a steady rate throughout your hike. To keep your breathing steady, time it to match your footsteps. Finding the right breathing speed is individual and depends on your personal fitness level. If you are running out of breath as you hike, consider slowing your pace.
Employed at New 2nd Capital in New York City, Kate Merli is responsible for tracking investment data, managing the annual financial review process, and overseeing providers of external services. In her free time, Kate Merli enjoys watching New England Patriots football. During the 2018 football season, the New England Patriots Charitable Foundation and the Kraft company hosted a marathon and half marathon in Gillette Stadium. The race served as a Boston Marathon qualifying event, the only one held entirely inside an NFL stadium, and it raised more than $70,000 for the Patriots Foundation to serve the homeless. In December 2018, the Patriots Foundation used the funds from the marathon to buy more than 700 water-resistant winter coats. Specially made to transform into sleeping bags, the “Empowerment Coats” were designed by a young entrepreneur named Veronika Scott who wanted to help people facing life on the streets. Ms. Scott started by passing out the coats herself in Detroit. She later began hiring men and women who are homeless to make more coats. For the past five years, the Patriots Foundation has helped distribute Ms. Scott’s Empowerment Coats to homeless people across New England.
A graduate of Bentley University, Kate Merli holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in accountancy. Since completing her education, she has worked in positions as senior audit associate for KPMG and controller for Atlas Venture. Today, Kate Merli serves as CFO of New 2ND Capital, a private equity fund dedicated to investing in middle market businesses.Middle market companies are those that occupy the middle of the market in which they operate. Although there is not set value for revenues of a middle market firm, some believe these companies make between $5 million to $3 billion a year, on average. However, there are outliers in any industry, and entities may fall outside this range depending on the other companies in the market.Since the annual revenue of middle market companies varies so much, it is generally divided into three subcategories: lower, middle, and upper middle market. Lower middle market companies operate in the lowest range of middle market businesses and typically make between $5 million and $50 million in annual revenue. Middle companies make between $50 million and $500 million, and upper middle market businesses make more than $500 million. These distinctions are important, since buyers and investment banks may specialize or focus only on a specific subcategory.While revenue is the most common way to define middle market companies, these businesses are also categorized by the number of employees they have on staff. Most businesses are considered middle market firms if their employment ranges between 100 and 2,000 employees. Again, this varies depending on what is the middle for a specific industry.
New York-based finance professional Kate Merli serves as chief financial officer of New 2ND Capital, a private equity fund focused on investing in middle market companies. Possessing more than a decade of experience, Kate Merli has a strong understanding of valuations.There are three conventional approaches to valuing a company: the cost approach, income approach, and market approach. To properly value a business, professionals may use any of these approaches individually or combine them. Each is briefly described below:Income approachFocused on a company’s future, the income approach to valuation converts predicted returns on investment to a current dollar amount, based on estimates of future cash flow. These estimates include future revenue growth, operating profitability, working capital requirements, and capital expenditure needs. To account for the risks associated with achieving the projected cash flow, the current valuation amount is often lower than the predicted income.Cost approachThis approach determines valuation from a company’s current asset value, compared to the estimated value of liabilities. In many cases, this amount represents the floor value of the company, or the value a company can generate if its assets are entirely liquidated. Since cost approach valuations do not reflect future value, they are primarily used in the valuation of a holding company or capital-intensive business.Market approachUnlike income and cost approaches to valuation, a market approach focuses largely on the valuation of a business’ competing companies. The idea of this approach is that current stock market data of recently sold companies can provide an accurate idea of the value of a business with similar revenue, transactions, and growth.
