92% of US small-business exits end in the business shutting down, not selling, not passing on. Just gone.

McKinsey's Feb 2026 report: most of these aren't failing companies, they're profitable firms that die because no one buys them.
— of 510,000 SMB exits in 2022, 92% were closures, 5% sales, 3% family transfers
— 6-13% were avoidable, viable businesses lost to inaction
— by 2035, 1M+ viable businesses worth $5T hit the market

We glorify starting companies and quietly let profitable ones die by default. Acquisition entrepreneurship (search funds, holdcos, operator buyouts) is the obvious arbitrage on a decade-long wave of owners who'd rather hand over the keys than lock the door.

(PDF, 8.3 MB)

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/the-great-ownership-transfer-a-new-era-of-business-stewardship.pdf