Enron, Ep 2: The Visionary

Bad Bets

The Wall Street Journal

News, Business, True Crime

4.8 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 19 October 2021

⏱️ 35 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Former Enron CEO Jeffrey Skilling was arguably the face of Enron's meteoric rise in the 1990s. He took a sleepy energy company and turned it into one of the most innovative corporations in the world. By the end, Enron had its fingers in all kinds of projects - including America's nascent broadband networks. In this episode, how Skilling's rise set the stage for Enron's fall. John Emshwiller is the host of this season of Bad Bets. He and Rebecca Smith did the original reporting on which this season is based. Bad Bets is a production of The Wall Street Journal. This season was produced in collaboration with Neon Hum Media. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to Bad Bets, a podcast from the Wall Street Journal that unravels big
0:06.9	business dramas that have had a big impact on our world.
0:10.7	This first season chronicles the collapse of Enron.
0:13.7	I'm John M. Schweiler.
0:16.0	This isn't a history lesson, or a chronology of the company.
0:19.2	Rather, we're going to tell this story through the critical players in the Enron saga.
0:24.3	In these next few episodes, you'll meet the people behind the decisions that help make
0:28.1	Enron one of the world's most successful companies, and then turn it into a historic
0:33.4	corporate scandal.
0:35.2	Starting with the man who is arguably the face of Enron's rise, former CEO Jeff Skilling.
0:41.9	Stay with us.
0:58.1	Wherever you get your podcasts.
1:02.0	In January of 2000, Enron hosted his annual gathering for Financial Analysts in Houston.
1:08.0	Enron execs were pitching them on the company's hot new venture to get them excited about
1:12.3	buying Enron stock.
1:14.7	Enron's COO Jeff Skilling was center stage.
1:20.6	Around Enron, as you can tell, we have kind of an entrepreneurial culture.
1:23.4	A lot of people do a lot of things.
1:25.4	The thing we look for more than anything else is it is there someone pounding the table.
1:29.4	Oh my gosh, Skilling was on his game.
1:32.3	He was the leader.
1:33.3	He was the idea guy, and he was firing on all cylinders.
	...

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