Books about Leveraged from Amazon.com

Inside markets, innovation, and risk

Why do markets keep crashing and why are financial crises greater than ever before? As the risk manager to some of the leading firms on Wall Street–from Morgan Stanley to Salomon and Citigroup–and a member of some of the world’s largest hedge funds, from Moore Capital to Ziff Brothers and FrontPoint Partners, Rick Bookstaber has seen the ghost inside the machine and vividly shows us a world that is even riskier than we think. The very things done to make markets safer, have, in fact, created a world that is far more dangerous. From the 1987 crash to Citigroup closing the Salomon Arb unit, from staggering losses at UBS to the demise of Long-Term Capital Management, Bookstaber gives readers a front row seat to the management decisions made by some of the most powerful financial figures in the world that led to catastrophe, and describes the impact of his own activities on markets and market crashes. Much of the innovation of the last 30 years has wreaked havoc on the markets and cost trillions of dollars. A Demon of Our Own Design tells the story of man’s attempt to manage market risk and what it has wrought. In the process of showing what we have done, Bookstaber shines a light on what the future holds for a world where capital and power have moved from Wall Street institutions to elite and highly leveraged hedge funds..
Price: $11.00 [Notify me when price goes down.]

In one word: egregious

Damn It Feels Good To Be A Banker is a Wall Street epic, a war cry for the masses of young professionals behind desks at Investment Banks, Hedge Funds, and Private Equity shops around the world. With chapters like "No. We do not have any `hot stock tips' for you," "Mergers are a girl's best friend," and "Georgetown? I wouldn't let my maids' kids go there," the book captures the true essence of being in high finance.

DIFGTBAB thematically walks through Wall Street culture, pointing out its intricacies: the bushleagueness of a Men's Warehouse suit or squared-toe shoes, the power of 80s pop, and the importance of Microsoft Excel shortcut keys as related to ever being able to have any significant global impact.

The book features various, vivid illustrations of Bankers in their natural state (ballin'), and, in true Book 2.0 fashion, numerous, insightful comments from actual readers of the widely popular website LeveragedSellOut.com.

Thorough and well-executed, it's lens into the heart of an often misunderstood, unfairly stereotyped subset of our society. The view--breathtaking.

Reader Responses

"After reading this clueless propaganda, I strongly believe that you are a racist, misogynist jerk. FYI, Size 6 is not fat." --Banker Chick

"Strong to very strong." --John Carney, Editor-In-Chief, Dealbreaker.com

"I used to feel pretty good about making $200K/year." --Poor person

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Price: $7.29 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Insider guidance to the modern world of investment banking today

In Investment Banking Explained, Wharton professor and global financier Michel Fleuriet provides a complete overview of investment banking in its modern form; defines key terms; identifies structures, strategies, and operational aspects; and analyzes the strategy in each of the main functional areas of an investment bank..
Price: $31.31 [Notify me when price goes down.]

"What kinds of investors actually choose to make their living by seeking out troubled companies and becoming mired in the complexities and contentiousness of a bankruptcy or out-of-court workout?" - Hilary Rosenberg (from The Vulture Investors)

Welcome to the big-time, big-stress-and big-profit-world of vulture investing. From the eleventh-hour save of Donald Trump's casinos, to the tempestuous history of Wheeling-Pittsburgh Steel, to the rocky restructuring of the massive Revco discount drugstore chain, Hilary Rosenberg takes us on a fast-moving journey through some of the major bankruptcies of the 1980s and 1990s-and brings to life the infamous, talented arbiters at the heart of their recovery. Meet the so-called "vulture investors" who cast their sights on distressed concerns, buy out debt, and skillfully forge their way to rich returns. Quietly upstaging the flashier corporate tycoons and raiders of the previous decade, men like Leon Black, Ronald LaBow, Sam Zell, Talton Embry, and Martin Whitman have helped to make a more efficient market in this obscure sector of investment, and their success may even inspire the quickly evolving business cultures of Asia and Latin America.

The vulture investors made their way to the forefront of American business during the troubled period when declaring bankruptcy became commonplace among debt-heavy companies. Buying out debt and seeing through the rehabilitation of companies as well-known as Sunbeam and Bloomingdale's, these unique players have changed the face of the distressed securities market. In her own animated, absorbing, and original style, Hilary Rosenberg creates thoroughly researched reenactments of the vultures' greatest exploits to offer an intriguing examination of their methods and their madness-and reveals the important role of these controversial characters in aiding worldwide economic recovery.

Praise for The Vulture Investors

"A lively account of the hardy band of investors who look for-and find-gold in capitalism's junk pile. Rosenberg not only tells their stories with captivating relish but weighs the overall economic impact of their exploits. This book is a valuable introduction to 1990s-style deal-making." - Chris Welles, Senior Editor, Business Week

"In a tour de force of punchy business writing, Rosenberg dissects a little-known but increasingly common high-stakes financial game: preying on companies in distress. . . . The author relates these intricate, suspenseful narratives in a clear, lively style that always instructs and often amuses." - Publishers Weekly

"Reads like a good suspense novel." - Library Journal.
Price: $29.99 [Notify me when price goes down.]

A collection of case studies illustrates real-world techniques, implementation, and strategies on corporate restructuring
Over the period 1981-1998, public companies with combined assets of over half a trillion dollars filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Over the same period, over 400 public companies underwent corporate spin-offs, divesting businesses valued at more than $250 billion. Each of these companies, and all of these dollars, were in some way or another involved in corporate restructuring. Gilson's cases studies have been used extensively in executive programs and are perfect tools to refer to when faced with real-world corporate restructuring issues.
Stuart C. Gilson (Boston, MA) is an Associate Professor at Harvard University and a widely acknowledged expert on corporate restructuring. He has studied and published on the intricacies of both domestic and international corporate restructuring..
Price: $46.34 [Notify me when price goes down.]

In When Hollywood Had a King, the distinguished journalist Connie Bruck tells the sweeping story of MCA and its brilliant leader, a man who transformed the entertainment industry— businessman, politician, tactician, and visionary Lew Wasserman.


The Music Corporation of America was founded in Chicago in 1924 by Dr. Jules Stein, an ophthalmologist with a gift for booking bands. Twelve years later, Stein moved his operations west to Beverly Hills and hired Lew Wasserman. From his meager beginnings as a movie-theater usher in Cleveland, Wasserman ultimately ascended to the post of president of MCA, and the company became the most powerful force in Hollywood, regarded with a mixture of fear and awe.

In his signature black suit and black knit tie, Was-serman took Hollywood by storm. He shifted the balance of power from the studios—which had seven-year contractual strangleholds on the stars—to the talent, who became profit partners. When an antitrust suit forced MCA’s evolution from talent agency to film- and television-production company, it was Wasserman who parlayed the control of a wide variety of entertainment and media products into a new type of Hollywood power base. There was only Washington left to conquer, and conquer it Wasserman did, quietly brokering alliances with Democratic and Republican administrations alike.

That Wasserman’s reach extended from the underworld to the White House only added to his mystique. Among his friends were Teamster boss Jimmy Hoffa, mob lawyer Sidney Korshak, and gangster Moe Dalitz—along with Presidents Johnson, Clinton, and especially Reagan, who enjoyed a particularly close and mutually beneficial relationship with Wasserman. He was equally intimate with Hollywood royalty, from Bette Davis and Jimmy Stewart to Steven Spielberg, who began his career at MCA and once described Wasserman’s eyeglasses as looking like two giant movie screens.

The history of MCA is really the history of a revolution. Lew Wasserman ushered in the Hollywood we know today. He is the link between the old-school moguls with their ironclad studio contracts and the new industry defined by multimedia conglomerates, power agents, multimillionaire actors, and profit sharing. In the hands of Connie Bruck, the story of Lew Wasserman’s rise to power takes on an almost Shakespearean scope. When Hollywood Had a King reveals the industry’s greatest untold story: how a stealthy, enterprising power broker became, for a time, Tinseltown’s absolute monarch.


From the Hardcover edition..
Price: $9.99 [Notify me when price goes down.]

A widespread misunderstanding concerning leveraged buyouts (LBOs) is the belief that they accomplish little but the ruin of companies and the loss of employment How else could it be? Until recently, journalists, including much of the business press, have depicted LBO specialists as generally greedy, if not sinister, forces whose activities compound the dislocations of modern American economic and social life. This kind of criticism reached a crescendo in the press and in Congress at the end of the 1980s, and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts found itself in the middle of the controversy. Based on interviews with partners of the firm and on unprecedented access to KKR's records, George P. Baker and George David Smith have written a definitive account of how KKR has approached LBOs in a book that will appeal to the specialist and general reader alike. The authors focus on KKR's founding, evolution, and innovations as ways to understand issues in modern American business. In examining KKR as a unique form of enterprise--one that subscribes to a set of alternative perspectives on business and value creation--the book bridges the gap between public perception and academic knowledge of how financial innovation impacts economic life. The firm's approach to leveraged buyouts was an important aspect of the corporate restructuring and governance reforms in the American economy from the mid-1970s through 1990 (the years of what some have called the "leveraged buyout movement"). KKR and other companies fundamentally altered the prevailing perception of the role of debt in the modern American corporation and established an alternative model for organizing and managing corporate enterprises. KKR financed the companies it acquired with high levels of debt, while linking their ownership to management. It then imposed rigorous monitoring by the board of directors over the companies in its portfolio. This combination of factors forced managers to concentrate not on growth but rather on how to achieve value through whatever means was most appropriate to the company's circumstances. The purpose of the leveraged buyout was to realize, or "create," value in companies by reforming their management systems. KKR's approach to restructuring the relationship between owners and managers in a highly leveraged firm rested on a basic principle: Make managers owners by making them invest a significant share of their personal wealth in the enterprises they manage, and they will have stronger incentives to act in the best interests of all shareholders..
Price: $14.95 [Notify me when price goes down.]

A complete how-to guide to a 100 0.000000inanced business How to Buy a Great Business with no Cash Down Bestselling author Dr. Arnold Goldstein has successfully purchased 12 companies--including retail stores to printing plants--and he did it without investing any money of his own! Using his proven formula for success, he also has guided hundreds of other enterprising but financially limited people into their own 100 0.000000e+00veraged businesses. Now, the master of the "No Cash Down" takeover is ready to help you too. In this important new book, he reveals all his secrets, including how to successfully find, qualify, evaluate, structure, finance, negotiate, and take over any type or size business.using little or no cash of your own. In How to Buy a Great Business With No Cash Down, you'll
* Get over 50 proven "no cash down" techniques, strategies, and formulas that insure success through each phase of the buy-sell process
* Discover how to prospect the very best no-cash deals
* Learn how to avoid costly errors and common pitfalls
* Find out how to calculate what a business is worth
* Get all the same handy checklists, forms, and sample agreements the author uses
* Learn how to attract the right investment partners
* Discover how to negotiate a winning deal.each and every time!
* Find out how to quickly sell the business for an unbelievable profit.
Price: $21.94 [Notify me when price goes down.]

HIGH-YIELD BONDS provides state-of-the-art research, strategies, and toolsÑalongside the expert analysis of respected authorities including Edward Altman of New York UniversityÕs Salomon Center, Lea Carty of MoodyÕs Investor Service, Sam DeRosa-Farag of Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette, Martin Fridson of Merrill Lynch & Company, Stuart Gilson of Harvard University, Robert Kricheff of CS First Boston, and Frank Reilly of the University of Notre DameÑto help you truly understand todayÕs high-yield market. For added value and ease of reference, this high-level one-volume encyclopedia is divided into seven sections detailing virtually every aspect of high-yield bond investment. They include: Market structureÑThe role of investment banks in security innovation and market development, evolution of analytical methodologies, and recent leveraged loan market developments; Security risk analysisÑHistorical bond default rates, real interest rate and default rate relationships, and new simulation methodologies for modeling credit quality; Security valuationÑImpact of seniority and security on bond pricing and return, important trading factors, and a Monte Carlo simulation methodology for valuing bonds and options in the context of correlated interest rate and credit risk; Market valuation modelsÑEconometric studies which detail the importance of monetary influences, risk-free interest rates, default rates, mutual fund flows, and seasonal fluctuations; Portfolio managementÑHistorical perspective and comparison to alternative investments, analysis of indices available to investors, and specific portfolio selection and risk management strategies of professional fund managers; Distressed security investingÑHistorical risk and return information, plus an academic overview of the market and decision criteria for uncovering and investing in securities with higher-than-average risk-adjusted returns; Corporate finance considerationsÑEmerging firmsÕ strategic choice between external debt and equity financing, as well as the choice of issuing public versus private (Rule-144a) securities. HIGH-YIELD BONDS provides extensive coverage of bond valuation and the construction and management of high-yield portfolios. Advanced Monte Carlo simulation models for the valuation of bonds and options on bonds as well as risk assessments on portfolios of bonds under conditions of correlated interest rate and credit risk are demonstrated. In todayÕs explosive environment of multiple new issues and high risk versus return relationships, it is paramount that you get advice from analysts and experts who have been influential in shaping and defining the market. HIGH-YIELD BONDS will provide you with a valuable reference to this fascinating and constantly changing class of securities, helping you assemble a stable, diversified portfolio of fixed income investments that provides the greatest returns and the lowest risks..
Price: $43.66 [Notify me when price goes down.]