Founder & Executive Chairman, Element
Search every verified Martin Franklin interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. Martin Franklin, founder and executive chairman of Element Solutions and founder of Mariposa Capital, has been active in the special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) market. In November 2021, Franklin said he had filed two new SPACs, Brimstone Acquisitions and N2, and described the SPAC market as undergoing a "digestion period" with a "shakeout" ahead, predicting that fringe actors would eventually go away. He contrasted his approach with what he called the "story stocks" and "business plan opportunities" prevalent in the U.S. SPAC market, stating that he targets "very profitable businesses, market leaders in their markets, great management teams." Franklin also said that when buying a SPAC, investors are "really buying a two-year CD with equity upside" and that the real valuation occurs when a PIPE transaction is announced and reviewed by institutional investors. Franklin has also commented on the broader IPO market and economy. In September 2020, he said the IPO market "lacks discipline," with "valuations beyond reasonable" and that "venture capital needs to have more discipline on its expectations and investment banks need to have more reality in how they present opportunities." Regarding the U.S. economy, Franklin said in September 2020 that he did not expect a recession in the short term but anticipated "lower growth." He has also discussed his role at Element Solutions, noting in September 2019 that the company was "very high cash flowing" and "the most under levered company I think I've been in for a very long time," and that he had personally invested over $20 million in the company's shares.
“Well I'll say a couple of things. First of all I actually filed two SPACs today — one called Brimstone Acquisitions where I'm backing and partnering up with a fellow called Mike Goss, who used to be the CFO of Bain Capital and then the CFO of Sotheby's, and the second is N2 which I'm doing with Noam Gottesman, my longt...”
“I think SPACs are here to stay; there will be a transition — this has become a bit of a bandwagon with a lot of players who probably shouldn't be capital allocators becoming capital allocators and that's going to create some indigestion, but SPACs as a product are going to be a long-term product and I think they will m...”
“This is publicly listed venture capital — you're making a lot of promises of companies that are going to have performance criteria looking out where you don't really have a metric to look at until 2026 — that's venture capital, and I'm not sure that's well suited for the public markets; like many bandwagons there will...”
“I don't participate in that speculative process at all; the kinds of companies that I buy are high-caliber, with a long history of profitability run by good people where I've done my due diligence — people should know what they're buying into and caveat emptor accounts for something.”
“I do think there should be better gatekeeping, particularly for businesses that don't have revenue — the idea you can sell a story and cash it out before you've done anything to prove whether it's a story probably needs some kind of gatekeeper rules in place.”
“In the UK when we announced a transaction trading was frozen until prospectuses were produced and reviewed, which was problematic for funds that marked to market; in the US trading is continuous when a transaction is announced — I think changes being made in the UK will be helpful.”
“Who will be left holding the bag? I think it's going to be like 2000 on the internet — you'll have a lot of equity funds that will post bad results, but I don't think this causes contagion because it's all being done with equity, not leverage like the real estate crisis.”
“When you buy a SPAC you're really buying a two-year CD with equity upside — the real valuation of the company happens when you do the PIPE or announce the transaction, and most deals today require PIPEs where institutional investors like T. Rowe Price, Wellington, Fidelity will review the transaction and buy additional...”
“I'm trying to buy very profitable businesses, market leaders in their markets, great management teams, not necessarily story stocks and high growth if you like almost business plan opportunities. That's what's going on in this SPAC market in the US today, and what I do is much more fundamental, so it's very different;...”
“I'm gonna raise probably about 750 million dollars maybe more through Harvester. It'll be in partnership with Viking Global, who will I think be our largest investors in J2 which was the company that bought API Group.”
“API put out earnings this morning, the business is doing tremendously well, stocks up somewhere between 40 and 50 since we started. So we're very happy with the trajectory, very well run business and really the same kind of thing that I hope to do with Harvester.”
“It's actually an advantage to the investor because if you want to buy quality companies, telling somebody you want to buy their business for two or three billion dollars but you have to run around to maybe get the vote, perhaps you have the money and perhaps you don't. That's not, that's I call that flow capitalism, no...”
“When you go into serious conversations with companies that have choices, having that uncertainty is a gating item and in my opinion that has actually driven US SPACs sometimes to do deals that I would call suboptimal.”
“I know this from experience, the first three SPACs I've deployed I think eight billion dollars or so of equity in different vehicles over the last decade, who were really the pioneers of what became the more institutionalized scale SPAC business.”
“I do it in the harder way because quite frankly it's better for investors.”
Mar.11 -- Mariposa Capital founder and CEO Martin Franklin says special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs) are here to ...
Sir Martin Franklin, founder of Jarden Corp., joins "Squawk on the Street" to discuss the launch of his new UK-based SPAC.
Oct.03 -- Martin Franklin, Jarden co-founder and Mariposa Capital chief executive officer, comments on the outlook for the U.S. ...
Oct.03 -- Martin Franklin, Jarden co-founder and Mariposa Capital chief executive officer, comments on the current state of the IPO ...
Martin Franklin, Jarden founder, joins "Squawk on the Street" to discuss his new company Element Solutions. » Subscribe to ...
Oct.16 -- Martin Franklin, Mariposa Capital founder and chief executive officer, discusses where he's finding investment ...
May 3 (Bloomberg) -- Martin Franklin, chairman of Jarden Corp., talks about his company's products and strategy, and the U.S. ...
Aug. 25 (Bloomberg) -- Martin Franklin, chairman of Jarden Corp., talks about so-called blank-check companies like Vallares Plc, ...
UWI St. Augustine Conference on the Economy, Day 2 Mr Martin Franklin The University of the West Indies, St Augustine. #UWI.
Wounded Warrior Project video interview with Martin Franklin about his participation in the Badwater Ultrmarathon.
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