Private Equity, Venture Capital, Finance News and Assistance

It looks like Fannie Mae's and Freddie Mac's tenure as public companies is drawing to a close. Yves Smith at Naked Capitalism (one of my daily must-reads) has put together a helpful overview of the latest (breaking) developments in "NY Times: Fannie, Freddie Nationalization (aka Conservatorship) Imminent": Guess the powers that be were unwilling to risk playing chicken with the markets and losing.

The New York Times weighs in with a lengthy piece on Kohlberg's Kravis Roberts decision to go public via a reverse merger with its Dutch financial affiliate. It notes that Henry Kravis has been thinking about how to go public for about five years. It offers an interesting account of how the decisions was made. In the end, it seem like a decision borne of a problem: what to do with KKR Financial, which was really tanking in Amsterdam. That, and the fact that the Blackstone Group had already gone public, and thus acquired a valuable currency to make deals and lure talent.

Julian Tzolov and Eric Butler face up to 65 years in prison if convicted of fraud in connections with their ARS sales at UBS. Tzolov returned voluntarily from Bulgaria, which is a good thing. After the Samuel Israel incident, judges may be more apt to view Wall Street indictees as flight risks. Article

Reuters - Thomas O'Brien, the U.S. Attorney
for California's Central District, is emerging as a likely
prosecutor in criminal cases expected from the U.S. mortgage
meltdown.

The End for Fannie and Freddie Shareholders? A government takeover of Fannie Mae (FNM) and Freddie Mac (FRE) could be announced as early as today, with shareholders of the common stock facing the grim prospect of having their equity completely erased along with other major executive changes at the companies in a move to stabilize the mortgage market and housing recession.