Do buyouts need more bad PR? At least the PE house is not at fault here!

You can Bank on it:
Delist at that price? You’ll get
Shareholders iRate

Apax Partners (full disclosure – my team is owned by one of their portfolio companies…I like to think it’s Apax’s favourite one ) is trying to buy Bankrate. And some share holders are not too happy at the purchase price. Apax is paying a premium, of course, but some shareholders are not convinced the premium is fair.

Rather than the concerns of the conflict of interests that may develop between a private equity owner and an incumbent management team (particularly if that management team intends to stick around after the PE house exits), it is the management team itself that may be questioned in this instance. Has the share price been artificially deflated (don’t say sabotaged!) in order to present a more attractive purchase price for the buyout house and the management team/the team’s equity in the new deal?

The solution to all your woes – that’s if you are a GP and not a US taxpayer…

Private equity: /
Are you looking for lev’rage? /
Well, just buy a bank! /

1 buy bank
2 use leverage to fund new deals
3 refinance underperforming portfolio companies
4 clean up if all goes swimmingly
5 sell toxic bank assets to taxpayers if not, clean up
6 high fives all round

Private equity giant loses yet more millions, all perspective (or is that just the financial press?)

It’s all very well trying to see the positive in a bleak environment, but identifying a loss of close to $100m as good news seems a little “unusual”, to say the least.

When you think you see the light at the end of the tunnel, it’s as well to quickly make sure that you haven’t just been imprisoned for all eternity inside a giant torch…

Oh well done, fellas! /
We thought you’d lose more money. /
Let the good times roll /

Tumbleweeds, ghost towns, prospectors? Welcome to the fundraising Wild West (on the East coast)…

South Western GPs /
Can’t all be cowboys, can they? /
Where’s the darn sherrif?

Just on the off chance that you haven’t heard….here are the details…

Splitting up the record collection, PE style

Is it better to have invested and lost than never to have invested at all?

Girls, does it hurt when:
You make a commitment and
Some guy hands it back?

Love IS a battlefield