Adolf Merckle (18 March 1934 – 5 January 2009) was a German

entrepreneur Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value. With this definition, entrepreneurship is viewed as change, generally entailing risk beyond what is normally encountered in starting a business, which may include other values t ...

and

billionaire A billionaire is a person with a net worth of at least 1,000,000,000, one billion (1,000,000,000, i.e., a thousand million) units of a given currency, usually of a major currency such as the United States dollar, euro, or pound sterling. The ...

. He committed suicide at age 74 due to losses during the

financial crisis of 2007–2008 Finance is the study and discipline of money, currency and capital assets. It is related to, but not synonymous with economics, the study of production, distribution, and consumption of money, assets, goods and services (the discipline of ...

. He was at one point the fifth-richest person in Germany with a net worth of $9.2 billion.

Early life

Merckle was born in

Dresden Dresden (, ; Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; wen, label=Upper Sorbian, Drježdźany) is the capital city of the German state of Saxony and its second most populous city, after Leipzig. It is the 12th most populous city of Germany, the fourth ...

. In 1945, he fled with his family from

Sudetenland The Sudetenland ( , ; Czech and sk, Sudety) is the historical German name for the northern, southern, and western areas of former Czechoslovakia which were inhabited primarily by Sudeten Germans. These German speakers had predominated in the ...

, a region near the German-Czech border that was inhabited by ethnic Germans and occupied by

Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...

's forces in 1938. His family settled in

Blaubeuren Blaubeuren () is a town in the district of Alb-Donau near Ulm in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. it had 11,963 inhabitants. Geography Geographical location The core city Blaubeuren lies at the foot of the Swabian Jura, west of Ulm. Neighbori ...

, a small town in southern Germany between Stuttgart and Ulm. He was educated as a lawyer.

Career

In 1967, he took over his family company, Merckle GmbH, with just 80 employees. In 1973, he founded Germany's first

generic drug A generic drug is a pharmaceutical drug that contains the same chemical substance as a drug that was originally protected by chemical patents. Generic drugs are allowed for sale after the patents on the original drugs expire. Because the active ...

manufacturer,

Ratiopharm Ratiopharm is a German pharmaceutical company that is Europe's leading generics brand. Ratiopharm was owned by Adolf Merckle and makes generic pharmaceuticals. They are based in Ulm, Germany, with products being distributed in over 35 countrie ...

. For several decades he also held large stakes in cement company

HeidelbergCement HeidelbergCement is a German multinational building materials company headquartered in Heidelberg, Germany. It is a DAX corporation and is one of the largest building materials companies in the world. On 1 July 2016, HeidelbergCement AG complet ...

as well as vehicle manufacturer Kässbohrer. At the end of 2008, Merckle’s investment company, VEM Vermögensverwaltung, faced a liquidity shortage. VEM said in a public statement that it had shored up the equity capital of HeidelbergCement to support the acquisition of British cement maker Hanson using loans backed by shares as collateral. Since the market value of the shares slumped more than 75% during the

, banks demanded further securities and early redemption on their loans. Merckle made personal guarantees to the banks, also from his private assets. By negotiating with the banks he received a bridge loan to keep VEM afloat. In return he had to agree to sell Ratiopharm and his stake in HeidelbergCement to pay down debt. Also in 2008, Merckle made a speculative investment based on his belief that

Volkswagen Volkswagen (),English: , . abbreviated as VW (), is a German motor vehicle manufacturer headquartered in Wolfsburg, Lower Saxony, Germany. Founded in 1937 by the German Labour Front under the Nazi Party and revived into a global brand post ...

shares would fall; however, in October 2008, Porsche SE's support of Volkswagen led to a

short squeeze In the stock market, a short squeeze is a rapid increase in the price of a stock owing primarily to an excess of short selling of a stock rather than underlying Fundamental analysis, fundamentals. A short squeeze occurs when there is a lack of Sup ...

that sent shares on the Xetra dax from €210.85 to over €1,000 in less than two days. It is believed that he lost as much as €500 million.

Suicide

Adolf Merckle committed suicide on 5 January 2009 near his villa in

by throwing himself under a speeding train.

Personal life

Merkle lived in

with his wife and four children, three sons and one daughter. His passions were mountain climbing and

skiing Skiing is the use of skis to glide on snow. Variations of purpose include basic transport, a recreational activity, or a competitive winter sport. Many types of competitive skiing events are recognized by the International Olympic Committee ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Merckle, Adolf German stock traders Suicides by train Suicides in Germany Businesspeople from Dresden 1934 births 2009 deaths Officers Crosses of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany Recipients of the Order of Merit of the Free State of Saxony Former billionaires