The Credit Crunch and the U.S. Economy

LSE public lecture

Beginning with the subprime meltdown last summer, U.S. markets and the economy have been thrown into turmoil. Liquidity and default fears have created the worst conditions in financial markets in many years. These adverse developments have spilled over in the "real" economy, raised the specter of recession and worse.

Steven Rattner is Managing Principal of Quadrangle Group LLC, a private investment firm with more than $6 billion of assets under management. Quadrangle invests in media and communications companies through separate private and public investment strategies and across all asset classes through its asset management business. Quadrangle has offices in New York, London and Silicon Valley and will be opening an office later this year in Hong Kong.

Prior to the formation of Quadrangle in March 2000, Mr. Rattner served as Deputy Chairman and Deputy Chief Executive Officer of Lazard Frères & Co. In addition to his management responsibilities, Mr. Rattner founded the firm’s Media and Communications Group and was involved in many of the largest and most important transactions in the industry. He currently serves on the board of IAC/InterActiveCorp., Protection One and Ntelos Holdings Corp., as well as a number of private Quadrangle portfolio companies.

Mr. Rattner, who joined Lazard Frères in 1989 as a General Partner, was previously a Managing Director at Morgan Stanley, where he also founded the Communications Group. Before beginning his investment banking career in 1982 with Lehman Brothers, Mr. Rattner was employed by The New York Times for nearly nine years, initially as assistant to James Reston, the columnist, and subsequently as an economic correspondent in New York, Washington and London.

Mr. Rattner has served many philanthropic organizations. He is a former Chairman of thirteen.org (Channels 13 and 21, New York’s public television stations), a Fellow of Brown University, a former Trustee of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and an honorary trustee of the Brookings Institution. He is also deeply involved in public policy matters. He has served on a number of public commissions and committees, including the International Monetary Fund Advisory Committee, the President’s Commission to Study Capital Budgeting and the International Competition Policy Advisory Committee. Mr. Rattner chaired a task force on reconstructing the Balkan economies for the Council on Foreign Relations, of which he is a member. He is a Trustee of the Democratic Leadership Council’s Progressive Policy Institute. He continues to write on public policy issues for publications that include The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post and The Financial Times.

Mr. Rattner graduated in 1974 from Brown University with honors in economics and was awarded the Harvey Baker Fellowship. Mr. Rattner, 55 years old, is married to Maureen White, who is National Finance Chair of the Democratic National Committee, and they have four children.

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