Forbes published a book review of Jason Kelley's "The New Tycoons: Inside the New Private Equity Industry that Owns Everything." The review showed Jason's PEU love, which he honed as a former Bloomberg reporter.
Another ex-Bloomberg reporter had this to say regarding PEU's:
There are very few people out there who will talk and write honestly about private equity. I know from personal experience that the financial press is so eager to break news on "deals" that reporters (who are increasingly compensated on the number of "market moving stories" they write) can't afford to be critical of Carlyle, KKR and Blackstone, and risk losing access to people at those firms.Jason's book should ensure access for some time to come.
I can remember Bloomberg's private equity reporter - who you featured in a recent blog photo - going on TV to talk about the HCA dividend and calling it a "liquidity event." The reporters are trained by the PE firms' PR people to use language that they find acceptable. Wouldn't want to say they're "cashing out." I've never seen anything like it before.Even when PEU's confess to their insider connected ways of making billions, Jason provided a free pass.
Carlyle co-founder Bill Conway told Kelly that the seeds of the firm’s initial success was that they showed their investors that “we understood businesses that do business with the government.”Trained by PEU firms to use acceptable language. Kelley learned a whole book's worth.
