Up a down staircase

Whether they're firing, hiring, reorganizing or looking for work, corporate dealmakers have never seen a down cycle like this one. Here's how they're coping.

The company loath to stay in a holding pattern, instead charging ahead with some ambitious new growth initiatives.

Another alum from the Wilmington office of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP, Andre Bouchard, may be poised to become a Delaware judge.

Attorney Walter Moeling IV has advised Georgia banks for 40 years. In the past, he helped setup banking charters. Now, he's helping firms such as Silverton Bank manage FDIC receivership.

Benjamin Lorello blew out of UBS with 35 others for Jefferies & Co., but his former employer is crying foul.

Shearman replaces O'Melveny for HLTH, Watson sticks with Latham, Cleary goes cradle to grave for Nortel, Milbank bats for Towers and V&E helps Sinopec buy Addax.

When Watson Pharmaceuticals Inc. agreed to buy privately held Arrow Group for $1.75 billion, it used a team led by R. Scott Shean and Adel Aslani-Far at Latham & Watkins LLP.

Since inception over 20 years ago, Nortel has employed Cleary Gottlieb as an adviser. And despite bankruptcy, the telecom company continues to call on the firm.

The pending merger of Towers, Perrin and Watson Wyatt to form Towers Watson & Co. may change the structure of the executive compensation consulting in a way that may benefit smaller rivals.

China Petroleum & Chemical agreed last month to buy Canada's Addax in order to gain access to oil fields in Africa and Iraq.

Julius Genachowski takes over the FCC amid heaping praise from public advocacy groups. They may want to take a deep breath. Despite their great enthusiasm, the new chairman has worked for venture capital firms and Barry Diller's IAC, and there are some who say he still has to prove himself.

After months of pugilistic M&A tactics, including a tender offer and a lawsuit in Delaware, Broadcom is taking a kinder, gentler approach to buying Emulex.

Like Gannett, debt-burdened McClatchy fumbles an exchange offer and struggles with debtholders who may like it better dead than alive.

An Irish developer admits it's busted. But it's wants the court to keep it temporary alive to limit further damage.

Young Merckle has refinanced debt and hopes to sell assets. Success is far from assured, but he's not standing still. Several of his family's companies have caught the eye of both strategic and private equity investors.

Investment banking fees are still under pressure, and M&A's share of the pie is shrinking. Now at around 20%, compared with an eight-year average of 41%, M&A's shrinking slice is reflected by a fall of 58% in the first half of 2009, to about $345 billion.

After five years of heavy investment, Intel's backing of Japan's UQ proves the chipmaker's WiMax dream is still alive and well. But challenges loom.

CLO funds have been willing to allow maturities to be stretched out. Why are they being so easy?

Agrium's hostile bid for CF Industries has earned it a tender of 62% of the latter's shares but brings it no closer to negotiations.

As part of regulatory reform, we're getting a consumer products regulator, who promises to make everything clear and simple. Yes, clear and simple is good. But what does clear and simple mean in 2009?

What's missing from the Obama administration's regulatory reform proposal?

Matt Taibbi produces 10,000 words on why Goldman Sachs is responsible for everything bad. Does that mean everyone else gets off the hook?

The longtime media banker, exec and visionary is retiring. But he still has lots to say about the Web, the multiplatform model and magazines.

A key tenet of President Obama's financial reform plan is to ensure that all federally chartered banking institutions play by the same rules.

Banks that act now can mitigate damage from the commercial real estate blowup.

Alternatives to secondary markets for institutional investors.

The SBIC program is an untapped resource for private equity funds.

An ambitious turnaround ploy at Chrysler turns to colossal travesty for Cerberus. The private equity shop has taken big hits on its investments in Chrysler and GMAC.

How noteholders of Paul Allen's bankrupt cabler recognized a mutual self-interest and agreed to a broad restructuring.

J. Christopher Flowers thought he'd replay past success in the financial sector, but Hypo RE is a bust. His JC Flowers investor group likely will receive only €1.39 per share for its investment.

At least one blast from the private equity past has sounded this spring: the go-shop clause. In two recent deals, a seller used a go-shop to get a better offer, and in a third, the seller generated three alternate proposals but stood by the initial agreement.

Three big newspaper company buyouts go bust. Maybe local ownership isn't that important.

Covenant-lite structures did not prevent Aleris' slide into Chapter 11. Two other aluminum companies landed in bankruptcy this year, and more are on the brink.

Carlyle/Riverstone's unstinting faith in SemGroup proved remarkably ill-founded.

Sun Capital's Mark IV ran into headwinds saddled with debt. Three auto suppliers went belly up in May alone, and there are other struggling companies in the same line of business that could well add to that toll.

TPG Capital is poised for big gains from the sale of Shenzhen Development Bank. If the sale goes through, TPG's Asian arm will rake in nearly a ninefold profit on its $150 million equity outlay.

In a year of rare IPOs and exits, GT Solar went public and actually made money for its sponsors.

Here are some noteworthy PE exits over the past 12 months.