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Re: What did Krebs do wrong?
Author: BOB2
Date: 09-16-2016 - 17:01
Bob Krebs kept the SP afloat long after "bag of weenies" had already looted the capital plant, with years of neglected investments, and maintenance, in order to "diversify" the SP. He quite rightly tried to find a merger partner, that was badly needed both as a source of capital, to capture larger market share, and rationalize operations in a post deregulation world.... He seems to be maybe even be somewhat above average, for negotiating the changes in the RR industry both operationally and financially after deregulation, as a CEO.
The SP-SF was a hugely monopolistic merger that rightly shouldn't have been approved. But, it was a heads I win, tail you lose proposition for stockholders, on the merger, however. Since, they spun off all of the various divisions that SP had "diversified" into, as publicly traded shares, and we all made a killing on Gold and Catellus.
The sound reasoning involved in turning SP-SF merger down should have made us think harder about allowing the later west coast mega mergers, as well. These made for two very profitable RR's, but not necessarily all happy customers, due to less competition to and from west coast ports. And, yes, Bob Krebs was also part of that set of dominoes falling, as well. But, once again, he did well by us BNSF stockholders on that one for me, too. So well, that later, Jim Speakers pal, Warren bought it, and made us even more money.......
So, my take is that he did a pretty good job for me, as an investor, not so much as an employees, but this was the time when the men were being sold out by the UTU with folks "landslide" Fred Hardin and his ilk, like VP Byron Boyd. But, I can't even really complain about that, either. The "buy out" he offered, that paid off my second and put me through grad school at 37, was better than the door kicking you in the ass, that most employers offer as severance......so thank you Bob for my second career.
So, I'll be interested what kind of conspiracy theories we'll get to hear about whatever nefarious evils were perpetrated by Bob Krebs....?
The SP-SF was a hugely monopolistic merger that rightly shouldn't have been approved. But, it was a heads I win, tail you lose proposition for stockholders, on the merger, however. Since, they spun off all of the various divisions that SP had "diversified" into, as publicly traded shares, and we all made a killing on Gold and Catellus.
The sound reasoning involved in turning SP-SF merger down should have made us think harder about allowing the later west coast mega mergers, as well. These made for two very profitable RR's, but not necessarily all happy customers, due to less competition to and from west coast ports. And, yes, Bob Krebs was also part of that set of dominoes falling, as well. But, once again, he did well by us BNSF stockholders on that one for me, too. So well, that later, Jim Speakers pal, Warren bought it, and made us even more money.......
So, my take is that he did a pretty good job for me, as an investor, not so much as an employees, but this was the time when the men were being sold out by the UTU with folks "landslide" Fred Hardin and his ilk, like VP Byron Boyd. But, I can't even really complain about that, either. The "buy out" he offered, that paid off my second and put me through grad school at 37, was better than the door kicking you in the ass, that most employers offer as severance......so thank you Bob for my second career.
So, I'll be interested what kind of conspiracy theories we'll get to hear about whatever nefarious evils were perpetrated by Bob Krebs....?
