Friday, March 16, 2018

Vampire-Equity Kills Toys-R-Us

The formula for private equity outfits is simple.  Buy a distressed company, re-organize it (sometimes by selling off parts), and sell it again, at a multiple of the buy-price.

See?  Simple!!

Of course, in the middle of all that, the private equity outfit extracts large-dollar "fees" and "interest" payments from the victim newly-acquired asset.

But sometimes, there's not enough blood for the bloodsuckers AND the newly-acquired asset.  And sometimes, the 'asset' cannot be saved.  So, with only $470 million in "fees" and "interest", KKR, Bain, and Vornado pulled the plug and 30,000+ Toys-R-Us employees are .....out.

There are others that have paid the "fees" and died.  Some survived.  But KKR and Bain and others like them are not necessarily the heroes they'd like you to think they are.

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