12 Types of Business Financing in Canada - Which Do You Need? Commercial Loans & Cash Flow Finance

Are you serious? We can hear clients asking that already. Can there really be 12 different BUSINESS financing alternatives in Canada available to business owners and financial managers? And are they finance alternatives that make sense.

Actually we're not serious, there are actually more than 12 different alternatives, some are just a bit more rare or esoteric we could say, and not applicable on a daily basis to your company relative to its finance and growth needs.

For small and medium sized businesses in Canada the ability to develop an overall long term strategy and plan is key of course. At the end of the day you want to optimize business assets for borrowing and determine which type of financing works best for your firm .That type of financing is going to come from two areas , clients and suppliers, and of course external finance sources.

When addressing where your business financing is going to come from in Canada you need to determine your optimal level of debt - many business owners don't always realize that certain forms of financing actually don't bring debt on to your balance sheet, they simply monetize assets.

So, on to what you have been waiting for! Let's do a short highlighting of commercial loans and cash flow facilities that make up our 12 sources of external business financing. (Your profits and suppliers and customers are your other source of cash flow by the way).

12 potential sources of financing in Canada are as follows - confidential invoice discounting , inventory financing, sale and leaseback strategies, equipment financing, purchase order financing, credit card receivable financing, micro loans, working capital lines of credit, bank operating lines, asset based lending, government small business loans, mezzanine and subordinated debt finance.

That's a handful for sure What it really comes down to is determine which type of financing is available to your firms overall credit quality . Often that is tied to what stage of life your company is in - we've referred to that in the past as which stage of life cycle your firm is in. That could be start up, high growth, maturity, and yes, ' distress'.

Unfortunately the larger your company is often plays into the fact that you might have more flexibility and ' wiggle room ' in Canadian business financing alternatives.

Is there a formula or roadmap for that is perfect for any one firm? Unfortunately not, each firm and industry is different. Seek a trusted, credible and experienced Canadian business financing advisor who can ensure you are aware of various solutions that are most applicable to your company... today!