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TIME: Almanac 1990s
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<text id=89TT0014>
<title>
Jan. 02, 1989: Business:Most Of '88
</title>
<history>
TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1989
Jan. 02, 1989 Planet Of The Year:Endangered Earth
</history>
<article>
<source>Time Magazine</source>
<hdr>
BUSINESS, Page 88
MOST OF '88
</hdr><body>
<p> TOP TRUMP TAMER
</p>
<p> Switching from gabbing to grabbing, former talk-show host
Merv Griffin outmaneuvered developer Donald Trump for control of
Resorts International, the Atlantic City hotel-and-gambling
company. The megarich Merv paid $364 million.
</p>
<p> COSTLIEST TYPO
</p>
<p> When Prudential took out a lien against eight ships owned by
United States Lines, someone wrote down $92,885 instead of
$92,885,000. So when the shipping firm went bankrupt and sold
the liners for $67 million, it technically owed Prudential only
$92,885. The shipping company eventually agreed to give
Prudential the proceeds, but deducted $11 million as the price
of the errant decimal point.
</p>
<p> MST $$$, BLDG W VU
</p>
<p> The world's tallest skyscraper, Chicago's 110-story Sears
Tower, went on the block for an asking price of at least $1
billion. Fearing corporate raiders, the giant retailer decided
to sell the building to raise cash (its original cost in 1972:
$200 million).
</p>
<p> MOST FRILLS ON A GOLDEN PARACHUTE
</p>
<p> Gerald Tsai, head of the Primerica financial-services firm,
grabbed $40 million in severance when he sold the company, whose
holdings include the brokerage firm Smith Barney, to Commercial
Credit Group. Part of Tsai's deal: 120 hours free use of the
corporate jet and a consulting contract that will pay him
additional income for time he spends working in the office on
his yacht.
</p>
<p> CHEAPEST ROUTE TO BANKRUPTCY
</p>
<p> Texas tycoons William Herbert and Nelson Bunker Hunt paid $1
each to ride the New York City subway when they came to town to
face a civil suit in U.S. District Court. A federal jury found
that the former billionaires, along with their brother Lamar,
had tried to rig the silver market in 1980 and assessed them
damages of $130 million.
</p>
<p> MOST ENDANGERED SPECIES
</p>
<p> The last Playboy Bunnies in the U.S. folded their ears when
their warren in Lansing, Mich., closed for lack of business.
</p>
<p> WEAKEST TAKEOVER DEFENSE
</p>
<p> Pillsbury's "just say no" strategy failed to fend off
British consumer-products giant Grand Metropolitan. The Dough
Boys also tried a "poison pill" strategy that would have
awarded current stockholders a larger share of the company,
making it far more expensive to purchase. But a Delaware
chancery court ruled against Pillsbury's tactic, and it was
gobbled up last week for $5.75 billion.
</p>
<p> BEST CAPITALIST GIFT TO SOVIET WOMEN
</p>
<p> Tambrands, the New York-based makers of Tampax, agreed to
manufacture the product as part of a joint venture with the
Soviet Union in what will be that country's first tampon
factory. The plant, near Kiev, is expected to produce as many as
150 million tampons a year.
</p>
<p> MOST BODACIOUS BIDDER
</p>
<p> RJR Nabisco chief Ross Johnson and some colleagues offered
to buy out the company for $17.6 billion in a deal that could
have netted Johnson $100 million. The bidding eventually hit $25
billion, but RJR directors rebuked Johnson and awarded the
company to the Manhattan buyout firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts.
Last week the House Energy and Commerce Committee announced a
probe of the deal.
</p>
<p> FASTEST-GROWING REPAIR BILL
</p>
<p> The official estimated price tag to bail out the Federal
Savings and Loan Insurance Corporation, which guarantees the
deposits of the troubled thrift industry, jumped from $20
billion at the start of 1988 to as much as $50 billion by
year's end.
</p>
</body></article>
</text>