Mr Kravis, noting that in the auction for Texas Genco the KKR club had only narrowly defeated a rival one made up of hedge funds, observed that "hedge funds know how to pick stocks and make a lot of money.
More professional fund managers know how to play banks off against each other.
For starters they solved any political crisis Russia might have, and lured former (and future?) President Vladmir Putin to lead their fund (he'll know how to get things done, they said with a wink and a hint at heavy-handed tactics).
Furman Selz Chairman Edmund Hajim grouses that U.S. mutual fund companies are "prohibitively expensive," but ING wants to sell retirement products to aging baby boomers and needs to have U.S. mutual fund know-how.
And the Culture Ministry of the French government subsidizes French movie production; African producers can access these funds if they know how.
What's an investor to do? "I would invest through funds whose managers know how to shift from what's too high to what's cheap," said Roger Kubarych, chief United States economist for UniCredit Markets and Investment Banking, who is based in New York.
But it is extra money for scientists strapped for funds, provided they know how to navigate the opportunities and pitfalls.
Scientists may be able to raise small amounts of cash through crowd-funding if they know how to deal with the public.
The benchmark, compiled by WM/Reuters for the last 20 years, is used by fund managers wanting to know how their investments are performing.
And on Thursday, Takata said the company was considering a victims' compensation fund, but didn't know how it would work.
Because I came from a nontraditional background, I didn't really know how fund-raising worked.
