PE Reading

a few weeks ago, i wrote the following post on analystforum. i think this directly answers your question. refer to the following(http://www.analystforum.com/phorums/read.php?1,783090,783990); excerpted below.

"Re: Best PE/VC/Hedge Fund books?
Posted by: numi (IP Logged) [hide posts from this user]
Date: June 12, 2008 11:30AM

For more academic purposes, I'd recommend "Applied Mergers & Acquisitions" or "Valuation: Mergers, Buyouts and Restructuring." However, LBO's are surprisingly rare in literature, and a number of books on the topic had come out a while ago (pre-1990). That said, these books are the most comprehensive ones on the transaction process, and if you have the time, dedication and money, these are great textbooks to have.

If you're just looking to learn anecdotally about LBO's, you might consider reading "Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco." This is more of a novel, but definitely a fun read. You get a pretty intriguing and amusing sense of all the personalities involved, and the book pretty much documents a mega-buyout gone wrong (and probably the least successful buyout in KKR's history).

If you're interested broadly in the LBO investment process from execution to exit, the Lerner casebook on Private Equity and Venture Capital is highly recommended. The case reviews do tend to be anecdotal in nature, but it's interesting to learn how different deals in different industries were consummated, as well as the various issues and complications that can come up during a private equity investment.

Finally, if you just want to better understand the key considerations of an LBO investor, and more importantly how they can be applied more generally to any other company in order to accelerate growth and create value, I highly recommend "Memo to the CEO: Lessons from Private Equity Any Company Can Use" by Orit Gadiesh (Chairman of Bain & Co.). I just started reading this a couple nights ago; it's a very quick read and is extremely practical. It obviously has its roots in the private equity investment criteria, but you can definitely see how the fundamental qualities stressed in the book are also important traits to assess in public companies. As someone who used to cover public companies but recently moved to private equity, I think it's very relevant and useful in helping someone become a "smarter investor" (as well as a better executor, for those of you that aspire to be C-level personnel sometime down the line.)

Most of the reading I did prior to getting into private equity involved the Lerner book, as well as a bunch of investment banking training guides on LBO and M&A modeling. Probably the most useful thing I did though was to read the Wall Street Journal every day (when big buyouts were actually happening), and also speak with my friends in the PE industry to learn about the deals. But all the books I mentioned above are pretty useful...unfortunately there isn't a catch-all book on leveraged buyouts, but if you're serious about the field, you'll read everything good that you can get your hands on.

Hope this helps."

thanks for the contributions numi.

numi: is watching the movie a good substitute for reading Barbarians at the Gate? I'm pressed for time and based on you post, i think I might buy the casebook and work through it...maybe the vault guide will also help me, so I'm thinking about that too.

Let me know about Barbarians at the Gate.