Guy Wyser-Pratte

Guy P. Wyser- Pratte ( born June 21, 1940 in Vichy) is an American financial investor and corporate raider, President of Wyser- Pratte Management Co. Inc..

Biography

Guy Wyser- Pratte was born the son of a Hungarian father and an Austrian in Vichy, where the parents had fled from the Nazis (see also: Vichy Regime ). His mother came from a family Grazer, who had emigrated after the First World War to France. His parents emigrated in March 1947 with her children in the USA from where Guy Wyser- Pratte was naturalized in 1953. He reached in June 1962 at the University of Rochester with a Bachelor of Arts degree in history and in June 1971 at New York University, a Master of Business Administration (MBA) in Finance. From June 1962 to June 1966, he never served actively as an officer in a reconnaissance battalion of the 3rd Marine Division of the United States Marine Corps off the coast of Indochina, where he rose to the rank of Captain and also volunteered for the Vietnam War, however, to the front was used.

The company now headed by him Wyser- Pratte & Co. was founded in 1929 by his father Eugene Wyser- Pratte as an international arbitrage trading in Paris. In 1948 it was refounded on Wall Street and merged in July 1967 with the company Bache & Company, in the Guy ( 1968 ) and his father had led the field of risk arbitrage. In January 1971, the company appointed him head of the arbitrage department, which he held until January 1991. There he had his first surgery active participation at the 1974 sugar refinery Great Western United ( today as Western Sugar Cooperative, a subsidiary of Tate & Lyle ). In February 1991, he built the family Wyser- Pratte & Co. new.

Guy Wyser- Pratte is the author of two of the Salomon Brothers Center of New York University in 1971 and in 1982 published books about risk arbitrage, which are regarded as standard works.

In the 1970s, Guy Wyser- Pratte was one of the leaders of the so-called Shareholder Activist Movement ( shareholder activists ). He says he has always kept to their basic teachings on shareholders' rights and the need for active involvement of managers in the success like failure of their company during his forty year career. In the past 15 years Wyser- Pratte has conducted more than 70 shareholding operations worldwide, especially in Europe. These include, for example, in France engagements with the company Taittinger, Vivarte (formerly Groupe André ), Strafor Facom, Maurel et Prom, and Valeo ( start January 2007, exit March 2007), in Germany at Rheinmetall ( entry in early 2001, phase- end 2001), Mannesmann, Mobilcom, Babcock Borsig ( went during its exposure to insolvency, by loss of over 20 million euros ), Vossloh ( entry 2006 exit after around three months in October 2006), IWKA (now KUKA AG, entry of October 2003; then he arranged for massive reconstruction and strategic change, as well as the resignation of six directors and seven supervisory boards; ), Balda ( entry in early 2007, exit at a significant loss March 2008), CEWE ( entry March 2007), TUI ( entry mid-October 2007 ) and Curanum in Austria Austrian Airlines.

Guy Wyser- Pratte was a member of the boards of Ingenico, prosody, Comsat, Prudential Bache Securities, Bache & Co. and Vivarte. He is president of the U.S. Marine Corps University Foundation and board member of the Congressional Medal of Honor Foundation. He is also a member of the board of the company founded on the initiative of Albert Einstein 1933 International Rescue Committee and member of the Council on Foreign Relations. In 2007 he was awarded the Alternative Investment News ' 2007 Lifetime Achievement Award.

Quotes

• About managers who do not participate through their own financial commitment at the company's success: "Do you smell the napalm? "
• About the former Lower Saxony Prime Minister and former German President Christian Wulff ( CDU): " Communist"