Ted Turner has lost 89% of his $10.5BN Fortune [AOL in Freefall]

The New York Post ^ | July 26, 2002 | Paul Tharp

[SlickWillard]

July 26, 2002 -- The stock collapse of AOL Time Warner yesterday is dragging a virtual who's who of media moguls into pikersville.

A growing accounting scandal sent shares of the world's largest media company to their lowest level since the early 1990s.

[1Old Pro]

I wonder if Ted is gonna call up the U.N. and ask for some of his money back...

Or did he even give them the one billion that he promised them yet?? Will he renege or will he give away his last billion?

[SoDak]

Ain't that the truth. I'd like to see his company go to Worldcom levels.

[gilor]

Turner, who's lost $9.3 billion

I hope this pig goes broke....Flat Broke!

[Smokin' Joe]

It would be neat to see the (real) ranchers at the auction.....

[Walkingfeather]

Makes me wonder if he still plans to give the rest of that billion dollars to the UN? Also makes me think about all those liberal scumbags that promised to financially help the demos this november... I imagine they will be caught quite short.

[lavrenti]

The way it is looking, you may get your wish. Case and company have a lot to answer for.

AOL-Time/Warner is literally becoming a penny stock.

[Paul Atreides]

Wouldn't it be funny if he had to go to a Christian-run homeless shelter for a hot meal?

[Ditter]

Serves him right. Turners CNN International has done more harm than can be imagined to our image abroad. People hate us who don't even know us because of what ole Ted has told them via CNN.

[SoDak]

I don't wish for other stockholders or employees to get hurt, but it would warm the cockles of my heart to see Ted Turner hurt so bad he'd have to sell his SD land.

[cake_crumb]

I said the other day that AOL stock holders were going to sell short.

[wardaddy]

I'm with you. My family's AOL basis was 40. I am suprised at Malone. He is usually a bit saavier than Ted and hasn't had to run on cult of personality like Ted. Levin, he knew what he was doing. He got greedy. Shame about his son though. All that money earned or lost won't bring back his murdered boy.

AOL is now just a dead dog in the portfolio. We hope the divided parts will recoup the losses to a marginal degree. It is not a double down stock...it's toast as we know it. Case the rube gets fleeced by Levin and Ted and the M&A boys and now the pieces will be picked off the carcass. there are some gems in there.

[lavrenti]

Ted may wind up giving his land to the Government to avoid the cap gains trap he's in converting stock into cash as his equity slides toward zero.

It is possible men like Gerald Levin could wind up penniless. Not that I feel sorry for them, but it is within reason. Ted, too, since this dunderhead tied most of his holdings up in this bogus corporate entity.

[wardaddy]

Didn't Case take the new stock as well? I don't see how this helped him. Someone explain it to me.

[Silly]

Only $24.5 MM left? That's not enough to keep him in stockings and fans.

[Oschisms]

Will AOL sell off assets like the sports teams?

I thought that was the best way to maximize shareholder value before AOL used it's paper money to buy this motley collection of real assets.

[sultan88]

This is kinda serendipitous, wouldn't you think?

[EternalVigilance]

"Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall. Better to be of a humble spirit with the lowly, than to divide the plunder with the proud."

-Proverbs 16: 18-19

[Taiwan Bocks]

Clinton's doin' pretty good these days, Ted.

Go down on him for some cash.

That was a typo.

[Reagan is King]

His ex-wife Jane Fonda was much luckier and escaped major damage from the wipeout. In her prenuptial pact with Ted, she got a maximum of $10 million in AOL stock, but in the past year she gave away most of it to environmental causes and liberal Democrats running for public office.

I hope the recipients of her stock decided to keep it and not sell it since it's almost worthless now.

Gosh, I just hate this for Ted and Jane, I really do... ;)

[My2Cents]

It's interesting. Bill Clinton schmoozed these titans of industry and got them to support his ego-driven grasp for power. In return, the Clinton Administration perpetuated a hands-off policy such that the stockmarket during the Clinton years soared to highly inflated heights due primarily to accounting smoke and mirrors. Now that Clinton is done using these useful idiots, the bottom has fallen out on their house of cards. Apparently, most of the wealth generated in the market during the Clinton years was illusory. If guys like Ted Turner have now lost over $9 billion of their "wealth", I don't feel their pain.

Clearly, the market is suffering from a binge of the Decade of Sleaze that was the Clinton era.