You Know Things Are Bad When Billionaires Start Suiciding

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‘Broken’ Billionaire Merckle Killed Self, Family Says (Update1)

By Aaron Kirchfeld and Sheenagh Matthews

Jan. 6 (Bloomberg) -- German billionaire Adolf Merckle killed himself, “broken” as his business empire crumbled under a growing burden of debt, his family said.

Merckle, 74, was hit by a train near his hometown of Blaubeuren, southeast of Stuttgart, yesterday evening, Die Welt newspaper reported. Merckle, whose holding company owes banks about 5 billion euros ($6.7 billion), owned stakes in HeidelbergCement AG and drug wholesaler Phoenix Pharmahandel AG.

“The dedicated family businessman was broken by his inability to handle the situation and he ended his own life,” the Merckle family said in a statement today.

Merckle, whose estimated $9.2 billion fortune put him 94th on Forbes’ list of the world’s richest people, had been hurt by bets on Volkswagen AG, a drop in the value of HeidelbergCement stock and increasing debt. He had been seeking emergency financing for more than two months from a group of more than 30 banks led by Commerzbank AG, Deutsche Bank AG, Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc and Landesbank Baden-Wuerttemberg. [Full Article]

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