> The root cause is that many of these long-standing chains are overloaded with debt—often from leveraged buyouts led by private equity firms. There are billions in borrowings on the balance sheets of troubled retailers, and sustaining that load is only going to become harder—even for healthy chains.

Oooh, I am so happy if this really happens. The entire financial industry that makes "profits" from loading purchased companies up with debt and then leaving them to die needs to burn in a fire.

The strategy certainly works in the short term (and nets impressive "profits" for the owners/shareholders of such holdings), but in the long term... let's just hope no one will ever be able to pull through this kind of "deal" again.