From Mitt's latest 'Morning in GOP America' spiel ...
Mitt Romney Delivers Remarks: "Freedom and Opportunity"
by Mitt Romney, mittromney.com -- March 30, 2012
Romney:
[...]
One must ask whether we will still be a free enterprise nation and whether we will still have economic freedom. America is on the cusp of having a government-run economy. President Obama is transforming America into something very different than the land of the free and the land of opportunity.
We know where that transformation leads. There are other nations that have chosen that path. It leads to chronic high unemployment, crushing debt, and stagnant wages. Sound familiar?
I don’t want to transform America; I want to restore the values of economic freedom, opportunity, and small government that have made this nation the leader it is.
[...]
He wants to "restore the values of economic freedom, opportunity, and small government" ... everything in GOP-land that
makes America great ...
Romney:
We have a sacred duty to restore the promise of America. And we will do it. We will do it because we believe in America.
This Tuesday, join me. Join me in the next step toward that destination of November 6th, when across America we can give a sigh of relief and know that the Promise of America has been kept. The dreamers can dream a little bigger, the help wanted signs can be dusted off, and we can start again.
Promises of an un-regulated Economy? Restoring those pedestrian
Dreams of just finding and keeping a job?
Insuring the Opportunity to strike it Rich for the rich, you know -- the Romney way ... that Leveraged-Buyout way:
What is a Leveraged Buyout?
wisegeek.com
A leveraged buyout is a tactic through which control of a corporation is acquired by buying up a majority of their stock using borrowed money. A leveraged buyout may also be referred to as a hostile takeover, a highly-leveraged transaction, or a bootstrap transaction.
Once control is acquired, the company is often made private, so that the new owners have more leeway to do what they want with it. This may involve splitting up the corporation and selling the pieces of it for a high profit, or liquidating its assets and dissolving the corporation itself.
[...]
Corporations ARE People too, you know ... think of
their freedoms and their opportunities ... think of all those assets, "just going to waste" ... for lack of a billionaire's perspective ...
Leveraged Buyout (LBO)
investinganswers.com
[...]
The risks associated with a LBO deal [Leveraged Buy Out] are why share prices often fall when a company announces news of a LBO. However, such a price fall can be a buying opportunity if investors think the company will be able to pay down the debt, which increases the value of the shares.
The world's most famous LBO is the approximately $25 billion takeover of RJR Nabisco by private equity firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts in 1989. The deal was so famous (and so brazen) that it was immortalized by the book and movie Barbarians at the Gate. In those days, many companies used LBOs to purchase undervalued companies only to turn around and sell off the assets (these acquirers were called corporate raiders). [...]
Well that's just how the Corporate Cookie crumbles, in Mr Romney's neighborhood ...
And if Mitt gets his way,
We had better ... Leave them Corporate Raiders Private Equity Investment firms alone!
Mitt, surely does know a thing or two about that favorite tool of corporate raider -- the LBO ... the exploitation of Other People's Money ... (and blood, sweat, and tears.)
Leveraged buyout -- wikipedia
A leveraged buyout (or LBO, or highly leveraged transaction (HLT), or "bootstrap" transaction) occurs when an investor, typically a financial sponsor, acquires a controlling interest in a company's equity and where a significant percentage of the purchase price is financed through leverage (borrowing). The assets of the acquired company are used as collateral for the borrowed capital, sometimes with assets of the acquiring company.
[...]
Companies of all sizes and industries have been the target of leveraged buyout transactions, although because of the importance of debt and the ability of the acquired firm to make regular loan payments after the completion of a leveraged buyout, some features of potential target firms make for more attractive leverage buyout candidates, including:
* Low existing debt loads;
* A multi-year history of stable and recurring cash flows;
* Hard assets (property, plant and equipment, inventory, receivables) that may be used as collateral for lower cost secured debt;
* The potential for new management to make operational or other improvements to the firm to boost cash flows, such as workforce reductions or eliminations;
* Market conditions and perceptions that depress the valuation or stock price.
[...]
In other words, those who live in Mitt's Neighborhood,
KNOW when there is great opportunity to be had -- THIS is their skill set, detecting any walmart-weakness.
Afterall someone's gonna swoop in, it's a free country you know, SO it might as well be Bain Capital, picking at the bones ... instead of them 'other guys.'
That is the opportunity Mitt promises to bring us from his vast wealth of experience:
Largest private equity firms -- wikipedia
The following is a ranking of the largest private equity firms published in 2011. The ranking was compiled by Private Equity International, which reveals that the world's 50 largest private equity direct investment programs have raised in excess of US$325 billion since 2006
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Rank Name of the firm Headquarters Capital Raised as of Apr 2011
(billions of USD)
1 TPG Capital US Fort Worth $ 50.55
2 Goldman Sachs Capital Partners US New York $ 47.22
3 The Carlyle Group US Washington DC $ 40.54
4 Kohlberg Kravis Roberts US New York $ 40.21
5 The Blackstone Group US New York $ 36.42
6 Apollo Management US New York $ 33.81
7 Bain Capital US Boston $ 29.4
8 CVC Capital Partners UK London $ 25.07
9 First Reserve Corporation US Greenwich, CT $ 19.06
10 Hellman & Friedman US San Francisco $ 17.20
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It's just business right? It's just
letting those Free Markets work their magic, Mitt will say.
All those LBO deals, are simply just "giving people what they want" ...
They are just 'accelerating the inevitable' ... weeding out the good from the bad.
Cutting out all that 'economic fat' ... in all those free market franchises ...
How Bain Capital made us fat
by Andrew Leonard, salon.com -- Apr 13, 2012
[...]
Bain purchased Domino’s from its founder, Tom Monaghan, in 1998, and was part of one consortium that bought a controlling stake in Burger King in 2002, another group that bought Dunkin’ Donuts in 2005, and a third that purchased Bloomin’ Brands, Outback Steakhouse’s corporate parent, in 2006. But Bain Capital is far from the only investor group to crave junk food. The private equity industry in general adores multi-franchised purveyors of low-priced calorie bombs, here in the U.S. and all across the globe.
Bain Capital’s record as a pioneer in private equity wheeling and dealing, however, along with its special status as the launching pad for Mitt Romney, demands that the company gets special attention. An obese, wheezing, diabetic nation wants to know: Can we blame Bain Capital for making us fat?
[...]
The basic private equity play works like this: Bain Capital, or the Carlyle Group, or whoever, borrows a ton of cash and buys a stake in a company that, for whatever reason, isn’t performing very well, or is somehow undervalued by public markets. But the problem with using debt to make a purchase is that you are then immediately saddled with the irritating obligation to regularly come up with significant sums of cash just to cover your debt payments. Fast food chains -- or any chain made up of thousands and thousands of franchises -- are attractive because even in bad times they are generating plenty of cash. Access to that cash is the key to successfully orchestrating a leveraged buyout. Bain borrows a few billion dollars, swoops in on the vulnerable target, makes whatever changes it deems necessary to spruce up the company -- selling assets, laying off workers, introducing the Triple Whopper -- while covering its debt payments with the cash generated by daily operations.
The result: It’s very difficult for fast-food chains to die, no matter how badly they are run. If they start to sputter, they automatically become an attractive buyout target for someone with access to the capital necessary to do an overhaul. The process can be repeated ad infinitum, as the saga of Burger King, which is now gearing up for its second IPO in the last decade, amply illustrates. [...]
Yep, that's "the Promise of America" --
Mitt's Free Enterprise Playground ... with a Fast Food opportunity on every corner ... and
a Burger-tending Job on every Resume ...
How did Romney put it again:
I don’t want to transform America; I want to restore the values of economic freedom, opportunity, and small government that have made this nation the leader it is.
Small Government, must make for 'eazier pickings,' eh Mitt?
Afterall, in Mitt's sketchy world, the US Government deserves 'not one dollar more from him, than the law requires' ...
Aahh, um ... How promising.
All that "freedom and opportunity" ... is for who again, Mr CEO?