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[Iolo]

Long read from the New York Times on Donald Trump's casino business practices, and how he repeatedly put up almost none of his own money, used business funds to pay off personal debt, traded on his celebrity rather than actual value, issued junk bonds to raise quick cash with no intention to repay, and left bondholders and small businesses in the lurch by taking his companies into bankruptcy. All while compensating himself very, very well.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/12/nyregion/donald-trump-atlantic-city.html

Read the article and tell me you don't see the exact same pattern recurring in his campaign. It is well worth reading the whole thing, but here are some highlights.

His audacious personality and opulent properties brought attention — and countless players — to Atlantic City as it sought to overtake Las Vegas as the country’s gambling capital. But a close examination of regulatory reviews, court records and security filings by The New York Times leaves little doubt that Mr. Trump’s casino business was a protracted failure. Though he now says his casinos were overtaken by the same tidal wave that eventually slammed this seaside city’s gambling industry, in reality he was failing in Atlantic City long before Atlantic City itself was failing.

But even as his companies did poorly, Mr. Trump did well. He put up little of his own money, shifted personal debts to the casinos and collected millions of dollars in salary, bonuses and other payments. The burden of his failures fell on investors and others who had bet on his business acumen.

Mr. Trump told the commission in 1988 that he could rein in expenses, because conventional lenders were lining up to give him money at low interest rates. He said he abhorred junk bonds, which were then popular, because they carried a bigger risk of default and thus came with higher interest rates.

Within months, he reversed course, issuing $675 million worth of junk bonds, with a 14 percent interest rate, to finish construction and get the Taj open. In recent interviews, Mr. Trump has said that with each financing he routinely took money out of the casinos to invest in Manhattan real estate. Total debt on the Taj exceeded $820 million.

Less than two weeks before the casino opened, Marvin B. Roffman, a casino analyst at Janney Montgomery Scott, an investment firm based in Philadelphia, told The Wall Street Journal that the Taj would need to reap $1.3 million a day just to make its interest payments, a sum no casino had ever achieved.

“The market just isn’t there,” Mr. Roffman told The Journal.

Mr. Trump retaliated, demanding that Janney Montgomery Scott fire Mr. Roffman. It did.

His agreements with lenders and the two casino bankruptcies in those years still left Mr. Trump personally responsible for more than $100 million in debt, and his agreements had only delayed the day of reckoning to June 30, 1995.

He dealt with that danger by first shifting much of his personal debt onto his casinos, then onto a new group: shareholders.

Step 1 came in 1993, when his company sold more junk bonds, adding another $100 million in debt to the Trump Plaza casino. More than half of the new money went to pay off Mr. Trump’s unrelated personal loans.

Then, in June 1995, with the risk of being forced into bankruptcy just weeks away, Mr. Trump shifted ownership of the Plaza casino to a new, publicly traded company: Trump Hotels and Casino Resorts. In the initial public offering, 10 million shares were sold at $14. At the same time, the company also sold another $155 million in junk bonds, at a 15.5 percent interest rate.

...

Indeed, the company posted losses of $66 million in 1996, $42 million in 1997 and $40 million in 1998. Those losses would continue.

Still, Mr. Trump made money, receiving $1 million a year for what was essentially a part-time job. In 1996, he was paid a $5 million bonus. The public company lent him $3 million to cover costs he had incurred while exploring whether to open a casino in Indiana, then forgave the loan when the stock met price targets.

Mr. Trump now says he looks back on the period as his golden era in the casino business.

“Early on, I took a lot of money out of the casinos with the financings and the things we do,” he said in a recent interview. “Atlantic City was a very good cash cow for me for a long time.”

Others were hurt.

“He helped expand Atlantic City, but he just did not put the equity into the projects he should have to keep them solvent,” said H. Steven Norton, a casino consultant and a former casino executive at Resorts International. “When he went bankrupt, he not only cost bondholders money, but he hurt a lot of small businesses that helped him construct the Taj Mahal.”

Beth Rosser of West Chester, Pa., is still bitter over what happened to her father, whose company Triad Building Specialties nearly collapsed when Mr. Trump took the Taj into bankruptcy. It took three years to recover any money owed for his work on the casino, she said, and her father received only 30 cents on the dollar.

“Trump crawled his way to the top on the back of little guys, one of them being my father,” said Ms. Rosser, who runs Triad today. “He had no regard for thousands of men and women who worked on those projects. He says he’ll make America great again, but his past shows the complete opposite of that.”

 

[johnsmith]

Was expecting a big story about this to come out soon. He ran his casinos into the ground, mismanaged them, treated them like personal ATM machines, basically stole money from investors. I guarantee you we will see ads from the people left unemployed after the bankruptcies.

 

[The Llama]

I have some very Conservative family in NY and NJ and even though I'm pretty sure they agree with his social views, they all completely refuse to vote for him because they've seen how terrible he actually is as a businessman in Atlantic City and otherwise. I have a feeling even more people would feel the same if this got more exposure.

 

[nature boy]

This looks like another attack angle that the Clinton campaign can use.

Trump will come out with "they're banks, they're not babies" and bam a SuperPAC goes with the people that lost a money thanks to Trump.

 

[RPGCrazied]

Would be hilarious if he only has barely a billion. He always goes on about he has 10 billion.

Lets see those Tax returns then. What a liar.

 

[Sciz]

Echoes the claims USA Today made about him fleecing staff and contractors.

The champion of the working man - except he's been constantly exploiting their trust and vulnerability with no repercussions. And this is the sort of business acumen he wants to bring to our foreign policy.

 

[Fat4all]

Trump is pretty notorious for his fleecing, during the primary you could see a few others try to bring it up against him but eventually they just devolved their arguments back to the circus-show levels.

That ain't happening in the general, tho.

 

[darkwing]

did the Republican party vet this guy?

 

[Beartruck]

Jeez, stuff is just coming out the woodwork like crazy about him this week. Is it because hillary clinched the nomination?

 

[RPGCrazied]

Jeez, stuff is just coming out the woodwork like crazy about him this week. Is it because hillary clinched the nomination?

The media hates him, understandably so. He is going to get destroyed.

 

[RustyNails]

Man you must be seriously inept if you cant make money off running a freaking Casino. How the hell do you screw that up.

 

[Iolo]

That's what his opponents missed in the primaries. Going bankrupt doesn't hurt banks, since the large creditors get paid first, have insurance and can absorb it. Who gets hurt are the small businesses, and the individual share- and bondholders.

After reading this you can see that he didn't just use bankruptcy as a tool to get out of debt, but he deliberately piled up unrepayable debt with the intention of using bankruptcy to foist it onto others.

It really undercuts his argument as a businessman. We will be hearing a lot more about this from the Hillary campaign.

 

[WaterAstro]

The John Oliver segment on Trump highlighted a bit of news where Trump got investors to make a Trump tower somewhere. It never got made and the investors never got their money back.

They got completely scammed and Trump didn't need to spend a dime.

 

[rokkerkory]

Burn trump burn

 

[Fat4all]

That's what his opponents missed in the primaries. Going bankrupt doesn't hurt banks, since the large creditors get paid first, have insurance and can absorb it. Who gets hurt are the small businesses, and the individual share- and bondholders.

After reading this you can see that he didn't just use bankruptcy as a tool to get out of debt, but he deliberately piled up unrepayable debt with the intention of using bankruptcy to foist it onto others.

It really undercuts his argument as a businessman. We will be hearing a lot more about this from the Hillary campaign.

During debates his opponents tried to bring it up, but could only ever scratch the surface levels before Trumps bombastic pageantry drew the conversation away to him being in the race at all.

It was a shit show, but damn good tv.

 

[Lunar15]

I'm not even sure bringing up all this stuff even works. The people who still support him, even at this stage, clearly are either ignoring anything the media has said up to this point, have heard but think everyone is lying, or simply are just bearing it because they hate Clinton that much.

There's got to be a different tactic to take to make people second guess their vote, but I'm not sure what route to take with someone so dense and stubborn at that point. Everything should just be focused on getting turnout for hillary to be as high as possible.

 

[Makai]

Man you must be seriously inept if you cant make money off running a freaking Casino. How the hell do you screw that up.

People keep saying this, but I don't get it. Casinos face similar challenges as other business types. If it really were fool proof, why bother opening a restaurant or a hotel?

 

[Somnid]

Cynically, this is probably a good skill set for running a country.

 

[Ithil]

I'm not even sure bringing up all this stuff even works. The people who still support him, even at this stage, clearly are either ignoring anything the media has said up to this point, have heard but think everyone is lying, or simply are just bearing it because they hate Clinton that much.

There's got to be a different tactic to take to make people second guess their vote, but I'm not sure what route to take with someone so dense and stubborn at that point. Everything should just be focused on getting turnout for hillary to be as high as possible.

It's not about convincing his die hard supporters, it's about destroying his credibility with everyone else and dismantling his easy talking points ("successful business man, speaks his mind, champion of the people, blah blah").

 

[Iolo]

I'm not even sure bringing up all this stuff even works. The people who still support him, even at this stage, clearly are either ignoring anything the media has said up to this point, have heard but think everyone is lying, or simply are just bearing it because they hate Clinton that much.

There's got to be a different tactic to take to make people second guess their vote, but I'm not sure what route to take with someone so dense and stubborn at that point. Everything should just be focused on getting turnout for hillary to be as high as possible.

Bringing up this stuff worked to great avail against Romney. Additionally this early in the election, there is still a lot of soft support from people who haven't really paid attention yet. Trump's support base is not cast in stone.

 

[Fat4all]

Cynically, this is probably a good skill set for running a country.

By bankrupting it and skimming money?

 

[Iolo]

Cynically, this is probably a good skill set for running a country.

It's a good skillset for a tinpot dictator whose goal is adulation and personal enrichment, sure.

 

[demon]

Cynically, this is probably a good skill set for running a country.

Do go on...

 

[phazedplasma]

I'm not even sure bringing up all this stuff even works. The people who still support him, even at this stage, clearly are either ignoring anything the media has said up to this point, have heard but think everyone is lying, or simply are just bearing it because they hate Clinton that much.

There's got to be a different tactic to take to make people second guess their vote, but I'm not sure what route to take with someone so dense and stubborn at that point. Everything should just be focused on getting turnout for hillary to be as high as possible.

It doesn't, especially with the NYT writing it. Trump voters will never see or hear about this piece and if they do they will ignore it.

Although I think HIllary will win, its unfortunate the Dems couldnt field someone who would at least warrant a choice between voters.

 

[Az987]

He'd be worth 10 billion $ more had he invested his inheritance in an index fund.

That's going off what he says he's worth too.

 

[Joe Shlabotnik]

It doesn't, especially with the NYT writing it. Trump voters will never see or hear about this piece and if they do they will ignore it.

Although I think HIllary will win, its unfortunate the Dems couldnt field someone who would at least warrant a choice between voters.

Nobody gives a shit about what Trump voters think about this

 

[akira28]

Echoes the claims USA Today made about him fleecing staff and contractors.

The champion of the working man - except he's been constantly exploiting their trust and vulnerability with no repercussions. And this is the sort of business acumen he wants to bring to our foreign policy.

that's kinda the business acumen our foreign policy is built on. Errand boys for grocery store clerks.

 

[Somnid]

By bankrupting it and skimming money?

Well typically you wreck and exploit other countries to increase you own gain.

 

[Plasticine]

did the Republican party vet this guy?

Racist, thin-skinned, con-artist who steals from the poor. Sounds like the perfect Republican candidate to me!

 

[phazedplasma]

Nobody gives a shit about what Trump voters think about this

I like to believe that there are still some potential trump voters that can be swayed. *shrug*

 

[johnsmith]

The Wall St Banks won't even touch him at this point, they know he's a deadbeat.

 

[Y2Kev]

I don't think he could get away with this today. The debt markets are so different and underwriting standards have changed dramatically. Banks and broker dealers are under such regulatory scrutiny that he'd never get away with making the restricted payments he made back then.

Trump is a fraud and needs to go away.

The Wall St Banks won't even touch him at this point, they know he's a deadbeat.

Even if they wanted to, they can't. But yeah they don't want to.

 

[Abinash117]

I'm not even sure bringing up all this stuff even works. The people who still support him, even at this stage, clearly are either ignoring anything the media has said up to this point, have heard but think everyone is lying, or simply are just bearing it because they hate Clinton that much.

There's got to be a different tactic to take to make people second guess their vote, but I'm not sure what route to take with someone so dense and stubborn at that point. Everything should just be focused on getting turnout for Hillary to be as high as possible.

There's different levels of support. Most Independents and Republicans aren't staunch Trump supporters. It is possible that extremely negative news about whatever Trump did in the past, but not what he necessarily said it could hurt morale and make more people less likely to vote for him. The same for Republican officials and Donors. Stuff like this can do a fair amount of damage to whatever he is a good businessman or not.

 

[Orbis Tabula]

Well typically you wreck and exploit other countries to increase you own gain.

Well, even with this analogy, it doesn't really work. The story is "Donald Trump ran a company and was willing to use it to screw over a bunch of other firms and drove the company into bankruptcy in order to benefit himself." So, transferring that over, you'd get "Donald Trump ran a country and was willing to use it to screw over a bunch of other countries to harm the economy in order to benefit himself."

This is only a good skill set if you think Donald Trump cares more about protecting American interests than he does about advanced Donald Trump's interests.

 

[johnsmith]

Even if they wanted to, they can't. But yeah they don't want to.

Yeah, well, Trump doesn't want them either!

“I don’t use Wall Street much because I don’t need money,” said Mr. Trump, who said he is worth $11 billion and has $1 billion cash on hand. “I do my own financing.”


From an interesting article a few months ago that like everything else, he overstates his influence in NYC.

 

[Iolo]

Nobody gives a shit about what Trump voters think about this

We do to the extent that some are supporting him because of his reputation as a businessman, or bandwagoning. Some of these voters are persuadable, even if it is to simply not vote for him.

 

[hoos30]

It doesn't, especially with the NYT writing it. Trump voters will never see or hear about this piece and if they do they will ignore it.

Although I think HIllary will win, its unfortunate the Dems couldnt field someone who would at least warrant a choice between voters.

NY Times today. Buzzfeed on Tuesday. Facebook on Wednesday.

 

[Condom]

Sounds like a typical job creator

 

[royalan]

I'm not even sure bringing up all this stuff even works. The people who still support him, even at this stage, clearly are either ignoring anything the media has said up to this point, have heard but think everyone is lying, or simply are just bearing it because they hate Clinton that much.

There's got to be a different tactic to take to make people second guess their vote, but I'm not sure what route to take with someone so dense and stubborn at that point. Everything should just be focused on getting turnout for hillary to be as high as possible.

The primaries are over dude. This shit may not work on Trump's base of support, but nothing is going to work on that group at this point.

Still, for Dems, Independents, and the majority of Republicans who didn't get on the Trump train but couldn't coalesce around another candidate soon enough to stop him? This is the kind of thing that will kill him. ESPECIALLY when the Clinton Campaign breaks down all the financial mumbo-jumbo into layman's terms and spells out in plain language how Trump fucked over small business owners and people who trusted his name enough to buy his bonds. It's "fucking over the little guy" at its most blatant.

Seriously, I did some reading on how Trump fucked over Atlantic City a few months ago, and it really should have been a bigger deal. What he did was borderline criminal, and makes any Clinton "scandal" look like just another day at the park.

 

[tbhysgb]

Man you must be seriously inept if you cant make money off running a freaking Casino. How the hell do you screw that up.

Oh, he made alot of money. It's just strapping almost a billion dollars to one entity to do it is pretty hard to overcome when every penny doesn't actually go back to the entity.

 

[Clefargle]

What a fucking moron, can't wait to see all his nonsense catch up with him

 

[Stinkles]

I can't wait to see his actual tax returns.

A lot of folks thought he was hiding them because he pays very little tax.

He's hiding them because it will expose his net worth as a tenth of what he claims. And his net worth is directly connected to his self worth. he can't extricate the two.

 

[DarthWoo]

Sounds far too complicated to be able to spin into a negative for the dumbasses who make up much of Trump's base.

 

[Iolo]

Sounds far too complicated to be able to spin into a negative for the dumbasses who make up much of Trump's base.

I dunno, I thought "Trump crawled his way to the top on the back of little guys, one of them being my father" was pretty succinct.

 

[Jisgsaw]

Sounds far too complicated to be able to spin into a negative for the dumbasses who make up much of Trump's base.

Just go with that:

He'd be worth 10 billion $ more had he invested his inheritance in an index fund.

That's going off what he says he's worth too.

That should destroy his self-maintained myth of how great a businessman he his.
Then add a little remark that little money he did make was by scamming small businesses and people from lower/middle class, and you're good to go. No need to go into details.

 

[ANDS]

"Like A Boss!" nowhere in the article. Lame.

 

[Future]

Doesn't sound bad for trump. Casino went into the ground but he himself reaped all the benefits. This time, let the US reap the benefits while countries like Mexico go broke while paying for that wall amirite? THINK ABOUT IT!!1

 

[RPGCrazied]

Doesn't sound bad for trump. Casino went into the ground but he himself reaped all the benefits. This time, let the US reap the benefits while countries like Mexico go broke while paying for that wall

Mexico already said dozens of times they aren't paying for jack. Try again.

 

[OriginofHysteria]

whenever my parents went down to AC they stayed at Trump Plaza since thats where they racked up the most comps. I went down there with them one time and it was actually one of the shittiest hotels I've ever been in.

 

[Stinkles]

My favorite quote from the article.

By December 1990, when Mr. Trump needed to make an $18.4 million interest payment, his father, Fred C. Trump, sent a lawyer to the Castle to buy $3.3 million in chips, to provide him with an infusion of cash. The younger Mr. Trump made the payment, but the Casino Control Commission fined the Castle $65,000 for what had amounted to an illegal loan.