The IRE Resource Center is a major research library containing more than 23,250 investigative stories — both print and broadcast. These stories are searchable online or by contacting the Resource Center directly (573-882-3364 or rescntr@ire.org) where a researcher can help you pinpoint what you need. Browse or search the tipsheet section of our library below. Stories are not available for download but can be easily ordered by contacting the Resource Center:
Search results for "portfolio" ...
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Education for Sale
Education Management Corp. was already a swiftly growing player in the lucrative world of for-profit higher education, with annual revenues topping $1 billion, but it had its sights set on industry domination. So, five years ago, the Pittsburgh company's executives agreed to sell its portfolio of more than 70 colleges to a trio of investment partnerships for $3.4 billion, securing the needed capital for an aggressive national expansion.
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The DeParle Portfolio
"The DeParle Portfolio" explore the Obama administration's health czar's moneyed connections with the health care industry.
Tags: DeParle; Obama; health care; health czar; special interests; ties; revolving door;
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Making money, raising eyebrows
"An examination by the Sun shows that the pension fund's $23 billion portfolio contains investments in companies that do business with rogue nations or whose practices contribute to social or environmental ills in direct opposition to the United States and Nevada policies."
Tags: business; pension; Iran; Syria; Sudan; Libya; child labor; nuclear waste; Nevada;
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Money To Burn: The Ohio Teachers' Pension Fund
Tipped off by a school superintendent and a former teacher, the Copley delves into the glaring incongruencies that highlight the State Teachers Retirement System of Ohio. The investigation reveals that though the system was losing $12.3 billion from its investment portfolio over a three-year period, its board and administrators spent $15 million on staff bonuses, artwork, parties, furniture storage, childcare, executive perks and travel. From the questionnaire, "they also boosted the system's annual budget by nearly $ 5 billion. Meanwhile, the health care costs of retirees skyrocketed and pension benefits declined".
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Wiped Out
BUSINESSWEEK tells the tale of how roughly 90 Proctor & Gamble workers were lured into quitting their jobs by the siren's call of a local stockbroker who promised them untold riches. Bill Gibbs, the stockbroker, convinced older workers to quit their jobs so he could gain control of their company-funded retirement accounts. As Gibbs' original investments began to falter, he sank his clients' portfolios heavily into tech and Internet stocks just as those sectors were peaking and about to begin devastating declines. Within a year, most of these workers saw their life savings wiped out.
Tags: A.G. Edwards; Procter & Gamble Co.; oil; health benefits; stockbroker; investing; life insurance; retirees; tech stocks; Internet stocks; portfolio; J.D. Power and Associates Inc.; First Union Brokerage; high yields; Dow Jones Industrial Average; Dow Dividend Strategy; Individual Retirement Account; Chevron; General Electric; General Motors; International Paper; 3M; high risk stocks; bankruptcy
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Hide And Seek
The New Times reports on the exploits of Dallas developer Lou Reese. Reese went to prison for his involvement in savings and loan scandals in the 1980s, but his creditors have been unable to collect the millions owed to him because his fortune is allegedly hidden in off-shore accounts, in his children's trust funds and in property in his wife's name. As a businessman Reese seems to be able to stay a few steps ahead of the game, even though his portfolio is full of questionable deals.
Tags: real estate; off-shore accounts; savings and loan scandal
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The Price of Being Right
A Fortune investigation examines how analysts on Wall Street have become "stock boosters, often serving as liaisons between the companies they cover and the investing public." The report profiles Mike Mayo, a star analyst at Credit Suisse First Boston, who "thought he could change the ratings game on Wall Street ... and tell people to sell stocks that were headed for a meltdown." The story details how in the spring of 1999 Mayo put a sell on bank stocks, stirring the ire of portfolio managers and bank executives, and got fired in the fall of 2000, shortly after his company announced plans to acquire another brokerage house. The author draws the conclusion that "if a top-rated, thoroughly respected analyst earning a seven-figure salary with a name brand firm can take this kind of career hit, Wall Street's legions of lower-profile analysts have little hope of summoning the courage to shout "Sell!" on a given stock or sector."
Tags: blue chips; brokerage houses; SEC; CSFB; Donaldson Lufkin & Jenrette
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Astoria Financial: short-term profits, long-term risks
Astoria Financial Corp., now the largest thrift in the New York City area, is buying mortgage-backed securities instead of lending to consumers, as thrifts typically do. Although this looks like a wise investment today and on paper, (strike while the iron is hot), some fear that it's a risky strategy should interest rates rise. The trouble is that Astoria has excess capital after buying many of the area's smaller thrifts, and it says it plans to make the money now in the market available for home loans over the next few years. The thrift has a respectable efficiency rating of 2.58, but that's due to its securities portfolio which is 35 percent of its interest income.
Tags: thrift; mortgages; retail banking; residential lending; bank portfolios; efficiency ratings
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What Dreyfus Didn't Divulge
Business Week investigates Michael Schoenberg, a portfolio manager at Dreyfus Corp. They found that Schoenberg had bought shares for himself in stocks owned by his mutual fund.
Tags: Micro-cap stocks
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Yakuza Inc.
Japan's long-closed financial system is finally opening up to the world with a major reform initiative known as kinyu biggu ban, or financial big bang. As part of this plan, U.S. investors are spending billions of dollars to snap up huge portfolios of bad loans from Japanese banks. What the local banks aren't telling their new customers is that crime syndicates, called yakuza, are behind many of the bad loans.
Tags: None