The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
why aren't all 8 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 0 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Sandler: Drexel collapsed after funding unsold inventory with commercial paper
“What had happened is, to prove they could still get deals done, they were taking a lot of securities that they couldn't sell into inventory, and they were financing it by issuing commercial paper in the commercial paper market. So in financial parlance, they w…”
Sandler: Ivan Boesky did very little trading with Drexel Burnham Lambert
“Ivan Boski was probably the most revered and respected risk arbitrageur on Wall Street. He had accounts with every firm. In fact, he did very little trading with Drexel. He was probably the largest equity buyer of securities of stocks at the time for any firm …”
Sandler: Princeton Newport collapsed before trial under RICO before winning on appeal
“The firm was out of business before the first witness was called in the trial, because under RICO, you could create a freezing of assets, and as a financial institution, that's very, very difficult. So, even though Princeton Newport case was reversed on appeal…”
Friedman: Drexel's 1980s high-yield market fueled massive private equity expansion
“The first three years that I was there, from 1984 to 1987, were a period of exponential growth, exponential creativity. Explosion in the size of the market that we were creating and the characteristics of it, and explosion in the private equity market because …”
Sandler: Drexel settled federal charges for $650 million in penalties and disgorgement
“They paid a very large fine. I think they paid six hundred and fifty million dollars out. Part of that went as a criminal penalty, and part of that went to as an SEC disgorgement fund, because they settled with both the SEC and the U.S. Attorney”
Milken: Drexel eventually made markets in 7,000 different securities
“So you had to be a market maker, and we eventually made markets in 7000 different securities.”
Apollo was founded to buy distressed assets originally financed by Drexel
“And a firm I eventually went to work for Apollo came out of Drexel, and their business was buying up the assets that they had been the investment bank for that actually raised the money and issued all the junk bonds.”
Friedman: Drexel Under Milken Taught How to Buy Businesses Without Capital
“I worked in the magical world of Mike Milken in 1984 to 1990, which was just an unbelievable place. It was a great place to learn how to buy a business if you didn't have any money, because we were financing people buying businesses who didn't have that much m…”