Romney at Bain: Big Gains, Some Busts

WSJ ^ | Jan 9, 2011

[yinandyang]

The Wall Street Journal, aiming for a comprehensive assessment, examined 77 businesses Bain invested in while Mr. Romney led the firm from its 1984 start until early 1999, to see how they fared during Bain's involvement and shortly afterward.

Among the findings: 22% either filed for bankruptcy reorganization or closed their doors by the end of the eighth year after Bain first invested, sometimes with substantial job losses. An additional 8% ran into so much trouble that all of the money Bain invested was lost.

Another finding was that Bain produced stellar returns for its investors—yet the bulk of these came from just a small number of its investments. Ten deals produced more than 70% of the dollar gains.

Some of those companies, too, later ran into trouble. Of the 10 businesses on which Bain investors scored their biggest gains, four later landed in bankruptcy court.

[yinandyang]

Interesting analysis by WSJ - naturally, Romney disagrees with it.

[Diogenesis]

The 911 Mosque and al Qaeda OWE Romney and Bain.
The American people ... not so much.

"(The GroundZero Mosque) cleared its final hurdle ….
developers plan to build the $100 million center which will include a mosque.
Since its incipient stages in July 2009, when a Muslim-run real-estate development
company purchased the damaged, vacant building and land where the new center
will be built, the project has sparked controversy and debate.
.... the tattered building that was bought by the Muslim real estate company had
been owned by a subsidiary of Bain Capital, a company Romney founded in 1984.
So it’s OK if his company can profit off the sale of the land ."

---

“Bain Capital, has cut checks totaling $90,000 to Romney’s operation. “

[wolfman23601]

Not here to defend Romney, but how does this compare with results from other venture capital firms in the same time period. The business is high risk and losses are expected, but the wins are expected to be huge. I am not so sure a 30% failiure rate is all that bad in venture capitalism.

[Nervous Tick]

I can’t stomach Romney, but, frankly, this is a big “so what”.

If anything, it plays out the American dream — take big risks, endure and overcome failures (lots of ‘em!), reap big rewards.

There are plenty of other pools of anti-Romney glop to drill for. This one IMO is a dry hole.

[nikos1121]

I think it shows once again that Romney has some big problems if he runs against Obama. He will be targeted big time as the Wall Street Politician.

His company was similar to Gordon Gecko of Wall Street. Go in, get rid of the mid levels, ransack the retirement funds, rack up high returns for the investors, company goes down the tubes.

Sure it’s legal, it’s the American way, but Obama will have a field day with this guy, who own five homes etc etc.

[yinandyang]

See 3 above - in an era of jobs, jobs, jobs (or lack thereof), he will be cast as a vulture capitalist.

[yinandyang]

Sorry, I meant see post 5

[yinandyang]

To be fair, Bain was better than KKR and Cerberus (the idiot private capital that took over Chrysler, put Nardelli the failed CEO of Home Depot in charge, and then converted Chrysler into a submarine company).

[Nervous Tick]

>> I think it shows once again that Romney has some big problems if he runs against Obama... Sure it’s legal, it’s the American way, but Obama will have a field day with this guy, who own five homes etc etc.

That’s a valid point.

[aMorePerfectUnion]

I believe the problem here isn’t that other firms do the same thing.
“Others” do lots of things.

The starkness of this is that Willard’s firm, with him in charge, used other people’s money to pay for firms in order to tear them apart for short-term profit, larding them up with a debt load they couldn’t carry. In the meantime, Willard waltzed off, pockets loaded, destruction in his wake. It was all about the short term interest of Willard and Bain. It wasn’t about the long term interest of the company.

Was it legal? Sure.
Was it ethical? I couldn’t do it. It treats people as less than human all too often.
Willard could do it. Could feel good about it. Desired wealth more than anything.

Each of us makes their own decision about things like this.

I think it is one more piece of evidence (as if we need more) that Willard is about Willard.

[CainConservative]

Bain = Where Wilard received his training on how to become 47th in jobs as governor

[CainConservative]

Bain = Where Willard received his training on how to become 47th in jobs as governor

[sick1]

CC - wish Cain was back. Thanks for an anti-Mitt statement that’s not anti-conservative or anti-capitalist. The only one on stage that makes this point well is Huntsman ... Surprised that Perry doesn’t except that he’s Perry and doesn’t shine in debates.