If venture capitalists can be happy about one aspect of 2009 (and trust us, not much about the year can be reason to rejoice), it’s that the year won’t be as bad as 2008. But that’s not saying much.

Last year, when the full impact of the credit crunch was felt by the VC community and everyone else, just six companies had venture-backed initial public offerings—a far cry from the more normal days of 2004 when 94 companies went the IPO route. To be sure, 2009 hasn’t been great either: The third quarter was the worst for venture capital fundraising since 2003. But the IPO scene is picking up, with at least 11 companies going public so far this year, three in the third quarter alone.

"The fact that the many in the media are classifying three IPO's as resurgence is evidence of how low our expectations have become,” said Mark Heesen, president of the National Venture Capital Association, said in a statement. One of those three, battery maker A123 Systems, earned big headlines when it raised $380.4 million (the other two were LogMeIn Inc., a Boston-based provider of remote access applications, which raised $106.7 million; and Nashville-based Cumberland Pharmaceuticals, which raised $85 million).

Heesen said that even though these companies have done well, their performance doesn’t necessarily speak to a burst of activity. “Companies simply are not registering to go public yet. On the acquisitions side, both volume and average disclosed value declined in the third quarter, which is not the direction we hoped to see. While the psychology of the market is trending positive, our original forecast of a true recovery not beginning until 2010 still unfortunately holds true."

In terms of fundraising, for the third quarter VCs raised $3.5 billion in 26 funds, according to Dow Jones Private Equity Analyst. So far this year, the venture industry has raised $8 billion across 83 funds, a drop of 58 percent from the $18.9 billion raised by 141 funds in last year’s first nine months.

If you go with the numbers compiled by Thomson Reuters for the National Venture Capital Association, the picture looks even grimmer for the third quarter. Just 17 venture capital funds raised $1.6 billion in the third quarter of 2009, according to that report.

Numbers for the fourth quarter aren’t available yet. But the fundraising through the third quarter of the year had been curtailed as limited partners—the wealthy individuals, pension funds, and endowments that supply VCs with cash—largely stayed on the sidelines. The limited partners were hammered by losses in the stock market and other markets and were reluctant to commit to the long time frames it takes to cash out of venture capital investments.

So if 2009 looked gloomy, what’s in store for 2010? Some 90 percent of venture capitalists expect their industry to contract with a central question being not whether there will be fewer VCs next year, but how many fewer.