Enron Capitalism
You have two cows. You sell three of them to your publicly
listed company, using letters of credit opened by your brother-in-law at the
bank, then execute a debt/equity swap with an associated general offer so that
you get all four cows back, with a tax exemption for five cows. The milk rights
of the six cows are transferred via an
intermediary to a Cayman Island company secretly owned by your CFO who sells the
rights to all seven cows back to your listed company. The annual report says the
company owns eight cows, with an option on
six more. Now do you see why a company with $62 billion in assets is declaring
bankruptcy?