Word: primerica
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Welch, who tried to sell Kidder to financial conglomerate Primerica in 1992 only to have the deal fall through, must first nurse the firm back to health before he can have any hope of finding a buyer. In the latest management shuffle at the brokerage, Welch brought in a new executive team headed by Dennis Dammerman, GE's chief financial officer, to restore Kidder's profits. "What I've got to do with Kidder is get it solidly grounded," Welch says. "Until Kidder gets stabilized, I don't have very many options to do anything...
...decade's reputation for grownup -- some call it downright uninspired -- behavior. Most '90s deals have been friendly strategic mergers in which the buyers use stock instead of debt and the partners exchange handshakes instead of lawsuits. Typical was last week's $4 billion agreement for financial conglomerate Primerica to acquire the 73% that it does not already own of Travelers, the insurance company. So too were AT&T's $12.6 billion deal for McCaw Cellular in August and the $6 billion merger agreement between drug firms Merck and Medco last July. "These deals are boring," says a disgruntled veteran...
...SAYS YOU CAN NEVER GO HOME AGAIN? EVER since Sanford Weill sold Shearson Loeb Rhoades, the brokerage firm that he created, to American Express in 1981, he has longed to regain control of the company. After several failed attempts, Weill finally hit pay dirt when Primerica Corp., where he serves as chairman, acquired financially ailing Shearson Lehman Bros. in a $1.2 billion deal that ranks as the largest in the history of the securities business...
...combining Shearson with Primerica's Smith Barney, the acquisition will create a Wall Street powerhouse that poses a serious threat to industry leader Merrill Lynch. The deal will also reunite Weill with a company he patched together out of a string of troubled brokerages during the 1960s and '70s. American Express had been seeking to unload the money-losing brokerage. Wall Street hailed the merger as good for all three firms...
...which last week announced 3,500 layoffs, 10% of its work force, has been desperately searching for a major cash infusion. Weill, who earned a reputation for shrewdness after creating what is now Shearson Lehman Brothers and selling it to American Express in 1981, appears to be bottom fishing. Primerica's stake -- at $19 a share -- is valued at about half Travelers' book value. Weill, who is also known as a cost cutter, will take an active role in Travelers' management. Primerica, which already generates 35% of its operating income from its own insurance business, will get four seats...