The new railway barons

摘要

Within ten years of the "golden spike" ceremony at Promontory Summit, Utah in 1869, the celebration of the completion of the first coast-to-coast railway, borrowings came due and a debt crisis shattered the exuberance. On May 15th, and in a new age of optimism, Warren Buffett and Carl Icahn detailed large separate stakes in railway companies. Neither investment mogul has given much explanation as to why he sees further scope for an industry in which share prices have more than tripled in the past four years. But they are investing alongside some activist hedge funds which are planning to load the railways up with debt.