Club Deals in Leveraged Buyouts

We analyze the pricing and characteristics of club deal leveraged buyouts (LBOs)—those in which two or more private equity partnerships jointly conduct an LBO. Using a comprehensive sample of completed LBOs of U.S. publicly traded targets conducted by prominent private equity firms, we find that target shareholders receive approximately 10% less of pre-bid firm equity value, or roughly 40% lower premiums, in club deals compared to sole-sponsored LBOs. This result is concentrated before 2006 and in target firms with low institutional ownership. These results are robust to controls for target and deal characteristics, including size, Q, measures of risk, and time and industry fixed effects. We find little support for benign motivations for club deals based on capital constraints, diversification motives, or the ability of clubs to obtain favorable debt amounts or prices, but it is possible that the lower pricing of club deals is an inadvertent byproduct of an unobserved benign motivation for club formation

Characteristics of patients operated for primary hyperparathyroidism at university hospitals in Türkiye: Differences among Türkiye's geographical regions

Purpose: The aim of this study was to define the clinical and laboratory characteristics of patients operated on for primary hyperpatathyroidism (PHPT) at university hospitals in Türkiye, and to investigate the differences in the clinical presentations of the disease between different geographical regions. Methods: Patients operated on for PHPT in the university hospitals of Türkiye were included in the study. The demographic, clinical, and laboratory findings and the operational data of the patients were investigated according to the whole country and to different geographical regions. Comparisons were performed according to whole country and regions. Results: A total of 1,162 cases were included in the study from different regions and 20 university hospitals. The mean age of patients was 52.4 ± 0.38 (mean ± standard error) in the general population of Türkiye. The rates of hypertension, urolithiasis, bone disease and 25-hydroxyvitamin D insufficiency were 35%, 18.6%, 67.6%, and 63%, respectively. The median parathormone (PTH), serum total calcium (Ca+2) and phosphorus value were 220 pg/mL (range, 70-2,500 pg/mL), 11.2 mg/dL (range, 9.5-11.2 mg/dL), and 2.4 mg/dL (range, 1-4.7 mg/dL), respectively. The median size of the adenomas resected was 16 mm (range, 4-70 mm). Significant differences were observed in the clinical and laboratory findings of the patients operated on due to PHPT between different geographical regions of Türkiye (P < 0.05). Conclusion: The clinical and laboratory characteristics of the patients with PHPT in different geographical regions of Türkiye differ. Furthermore, the general findings of the cases in Türkiye give us a hint that the severity of the disease here is somewhere between Eastern and Western countries. Copyright © 2016, the Korean Surgical Society

Effect of different cytokines on mammaglobin and maspin gene expression in normal leukocytes: possible relevance to the assays for the detection of micrometastatic breast cancer

In cancer patients, the ability to detect disseminated tumour cells in peripheral blood or bone marrow could improve prognosis and consent both early detection of metastatic disease and monitoring of the efficacy of systemic therapy. These objectives remain elusive mainly due to the lack of specific genetic markers for solid tumours. The use of surrogate tissue-specific markers can reduce the specificity of the assays and give rise to a clinically unacceptable false-positive rate. Mammaglobin (MAM) and maspin are two putative breast tissue-specific markers frequently used for detection of occult tumour cells in the peripheral blood, bone marrow and lymph nodes of breast cancer patients. In this study, it was evaluated whether MAM and maspin gene expression may be induced in the normal blood and bone marrow cells exposed to a panel of cytokines, including chemotactic factors (C5a, interleukin (IL)-8), LPS, proinflammatory cytokines (TNF-α, IL-1β) and growth factors (IL-3, granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor, granulocyte colony-stimulating factor). The experimental data show that all cytokines included in the panel, except for IL-8, were able to induce maspin expression; on the contrary, MAM gene was never induced. These results suggest that MAM is more specific than maspin and that the possible interference of cytokines should be taken into account in interpreting molecular assays for detection of isolated tumour cells