The stock market’s wild seesaw ride could give just about anyone paying attention a pain in the pit of their stomach.

But experts suggest that entrepreneurs should not be among them. For it could well be that entrepreneurs in the United States and across the world are better equipped than others to cope with the underlying economic uncertainty that led to a market that sank more than 500 points yesterday and bounced up and down today. That’s at least the conclusion of entrepreneurs, researchers, and analysts reached by Portfolio.com.

Here’s what some analysts and economists have to say about how entrepreneurs, their employees, and those they rely upon for financing will be impacted by the latest economic and market news.

Entrepreneurs

Daniel Penrod, senior industry analyst with the California Credit Union League, told Portfolio.com that the stock market's primary influence on entrepreneurs affects their brains, not their businesses.

“The market tends to have a big psychological impact on business owners,” Penrod said, adding that it shouldn’t. “I would argue that there’s a huge disconnect between the two," he said.

Sally Ernst, the London-based entrepreneur who puts together a quarterly survey of leaders around the globe of companies with $1 million or more for the Entrepreneurs Organization, told Portfolio.com in an email exchange that entrepreneurs make their own decisions based on their own businesses and markets.

“They're acting almost independently of what's going on in the economy. We have seen, in the main, entrepreneurs' profits and head count steadily rise over the past two years,” Ernst wrote. She did, however, point out that the worldwide economic uncertainty that created the recent market volatility may be keeping potential entrepreneurs from starting their own new businesses.

Penrod said that even in a downturn, there were and are opportunities for entrepreneurs entirely distinct from what happens on Wall Street.

And it appears entrepreneurs have been taking advantage of those opportunities, Brandt Leahy, managing director of new market initiatives at Sageworks, an analyst of private companies, said. In general, private companies have improved their profitability, though they haven’t been particularly eager to do a lot of hiring.

“What we’re seeing is slight margin expansion, and payroll is catching up with it at a modest pace,” Leahy told Portfolio.com.

Funding

So you’re an entrepreneur or a would-be entrepreneur and you have a great idea and you’re not scared by the fact that the Dow Jones industrial average fell more than 500 points Thursday. What about those money people you need to make your business grow?

Well, even there, you may be in luck, said Penrod. Someone who may have bought stocks previously may turn instead to angel investing, for instance, or become a limited partner in a venture capital firm.

“There could be a greater likelihood that [entrepreneurs] could find funding from people who are looking to avoid the market,” he said.

With interest rates low, entrepreneurs who qualify for more traditional bank funding may find the sun shining on them too.

And those who are trading equity in their company for venture capital or angel money may be able to trade less of that equity in exchange for the cash they need. That’s good for entrepreneurs, because if they can give less of their company away, they have more of a chance of controlling their own destiny after they get that funding.

Brandt pointed out that company founders, especially those in the technology field, have had little problem raising money from venture capitalists in recent months, and he doesn’t expect the market’s problems to alter that picture.

Employees

Employees, like their bosses, get a psychological kick in the chops when the stock market behaves badly.

But Penrod said he thinks the employees entrepreneurs count on to make businesses run should be more focused on another number report that came out today, the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ report on unemployment. And that number was unexpectedly, though only marginally, positive.

The United States added 117,000 jobs in July, while the unemployment rate dropped to 9.1 percent from 9.2 percent. That number was more positive when it came to private employers, who added slightly more than 150,000 jobs.

Those aren’t great numbers. But they’re better than they have been since April, and Penrod said they indicate the job market, though weak, isn’t as bad as the stock market fluctuations would indicate.

“Those are the numbers that I would try and hold onto a little stronger,” Penrod said. “To me, the jobs number is the key.”

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Kent Bernhard Jr. is News Editor of Portfolio.com