Barbarians at the Gate Quotes

“Recognize that ultimate success comes from opportunistic, bold moves which, by definition, cannot be planned.”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“The minute you establish an organization, it starts to decay.”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“Planning, gentlemen, is ‘What are you going to do next year that’s different from what you did this year?’” he told them. “All I want is five items.”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“Everyone in the room knew about leveraged buyouts, often called LBOs. In an LBO, a small group of senior executives, usually working with a Wall Street partner, proposes to buy its company from public shareholders, using massive amounts of borrowed money. Critics of this procedure called it stealing the company from its owners and fretted that the growing mountain of corporate debt was hindering America’s ability to compete abroad. Everyone knew LBOs meant deep cuts in research and every other imaginable budget, all sacrificed to pay off debt. Proponents insisted that companies forced to meet steep debt payments grew lean and mean. On one thing they all agreed: The executives who launched LBOs got filthy rich.”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“He who’s not busy being born is busy dying.” Tony”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“The Roaring Eighties were a new gilded age, where winning was celebrated at all costs.”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“Something had to be done fast. A letter: that was the answer. As many lawyers do when nursing a grievance, Nusbaum knew it was important to get their anger down into writing. As Cohen and the investment bankers shouted and cursed around him, he began dictating”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“Through all the machismo, through all the greed, through all the discussion of shareholder values, it all came down to this: John Gutfreund and Tom Strauss were prepared to scrap the largest takeover of all time because their firm’s name would go on the right side, not the left side, of a tombstone advertisement buried among the stock tables at the back of The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times.”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“It is important to remember that, as Ken Auletta wrote in his definitive Greed and Glory on Wall Street, “no reporter can with 100 percent accuracy re-create events that occurred some time before. Memories play tricks on participants, the more so when the outcome has become clear. A reporter tries to guard against inaccuracies by checking with a variety of sources, but it is useful for a reader—and an author—to be humbled by this journalistic limitation.”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“Sticht is going to be my sexual consultant," Wilson was heard to say. "When I want his fucking advice, I'll ask for it.”
― Bryan Burrough;John Helyar, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“fretted that the growing mountain of corporate debt was hindering America’s ability to compete abroad.”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“He was a master of disarming tense situations with the strategic joke, the well-thrown wisecrack, a veritable pied piper of the boardroom.”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“The minute you establish an organization it starts to decay.”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“Not that it's a fraud. You need money to be in this business. But not a lot.
You need more money to open a shoe-shine shop than you do to buy a
$2 billion dollar company, let's be honest about it. But to buy a shoe-shine
shop, if it costs $3,000, you need $3,000. If you don't get it in cash, you need to bring it in by Thursday.
But if it's an LBO, not only do you not have to bring it, you don't have to see it, you don't know where you're going to get it, nobody knows where
they got it from. The whole situation comes from absolutely nothing.

But, the more you need of course, the less money you need.
In other words, if there is money involved, you don't get involved in that business. This is a business for people who don't have money, but who know somebody who has money, but they don't put it up either....... - Quote from Jackie Mason”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate

“It all started with a small lemonade stand in Manitoba,” read one Johnson parody. “The next thing I knew I had sold my mother. The rest was easy.”
― Bryan Burrough;John Helyar, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“We're prepared to extend our deadline, Kravis said, on one condition: Pay our expenses to date, and we'll stay another hour. It made sense. Kravis believed he was in a position of strength; he knew the management group's securities hadn't been negotiated, as his had. He saw no reason to panic and boost the bid; they would have the opportunity to do that later, if needed. This way they kept pressure on the board, at the same time making sure that, no matter what happened, they came out with something.
How much are your expenses? Atkins asked. Raether had done the arithmetic. Their total expenses approached $400 million, but Raether, careful not to push too hard, asked for only $45 million.
"I think I can sell that to the special committee," said Hugel, who had stepped into the room. He returned minutes later with the board's approval. The agreement was scribbled on a yellow legal pad. Beattie smiled. No matter what happened, he was getting paid.
Forty-five million dollars to wait sixty minutes. Incredibly, Atkins and Company thought it was a good deal. p486”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“With every girl there was a moment before you broke up when you knew - you just knew - that if you left her right then, you would never make up.”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“changes in the story were the result of normal editing.”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

“turn over the reins to the board of directors.”
― Bryan Burrough, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco