Who didn’t see the financial meltdown coming? A number of prognosticators ranging from Texas congressman and one-time presidential hopeful Ron Paul  and New York University Economics professor Nouriel Roubini, to actor/comedian Kelsey Grammer—yes, we’re talking Frasier Crane of Cheers fame—all say they saw it coming.

On the investment banking and BV side, Rob Slee of Robertson & Foley in Charlotte has been predicting the current financial crisis for over a year.  We first heard his dire assessments in June 2007, at the IBA’s annual National Symposium, where he told attendees that the coming “economic apocalypse” would make the Great Depression “look like a cake walk.”  

Earlier this year, Slee told the BVWire that the subprime slide was “only a drop in the bucket,” and that valuation consultants should tell business owners (per his February 1st blog) to “Get Strategic—or Get Out.”  Slee has since broadcast the same message to banks and specific businesses groups, such as these articles to credit unions and design firms.  Over the past eighteen months, Slee estimates that he has “done fifty live events, two dozen webcasts, and a dozen or so articles” on what business owners and their valuation consultants can do to survive these difficult times.