Quote Originally Posted by MCNetwork View Post
It would be interesting to know what the default risk is for each successive advance that a merchant takes. I would assume that every new advance raises the default risk considerably. In this case, the 4th advance was the one that did the merchant in.
But even then, how can one say it was from the advance? In my hometown, just about every small business fails within 5 years, but most within 1 or 2 years. Nobody makes it, yet there is always someone willing to rent out the space the day the previous businesses shuts down. Small businesses there are like speculative short term investments. Make what money you can and then close up or cut your losses and leave. It's not like that everywhere though.

All small businesses eventually fail, that is why very few are celebrating 200 year anniversaries.