KKR’s TXU Buyout Facing 91% Odds of Default: Corporate Finance

The bond market has never been more pessimistic on the chances of KKR & Co. and TPG Capital being able to salvage the biggest leveraged buyout in history -- the $43.2 billion purchase in 2007 of the electricity provider known then as TXU Corp.

Since the private equity firms bought the Dallas-based company, now known as Energy Future Holdings Corp., with $45 billion in debt financing, natural gas prices have tumbled 50 percent as a process for extracting the fuel from shale called fracking rises in popularity. That has cut electricity prices in half as well.