Kenneth Lay Quotes (78 Quotes)


    But I can't take responsibility for criminal conduct of somebody inside the company.

    I am delighted to hear that Mike's surgery was a success. We knew he was in capable hands at Methodist, and are pleased that all went smoothly.

    I don't think I'm a criminal, number one.

    You'd rather have a surplus versus a shortage in your position.

    The problems in California have been that it's been very difficult to site and build new power plants.


    I'm sure there's absolutely nothing in my life, including the loss of life of many of my loved ones, that even comes close to the same level of pain, and the same enduring pain, that has caused.

    Any slots at the senior level, including CEO or other slots, will be filled internally.

    We have made it pretty clear to the government leadership we are now at a point where we would like to be taken out, and we think most of our partners do.

    The third quarter is looking great. We will hit our numbers. We are continuing to have strong growth in our business and, at this time I think we're well positioned for a very strong fourth quarter.

    When you have a monopoly franchise player exercising their market power, then usually we're out on the other side of those issues.

    It's been very interesting. We've seen a lot of interesting testimony. We've seen a lot of interesting people, a lot of allegations, a lot of lies, a lot of misinformation and some truth.


    This is an important step in our plan to restore investor confidence in Enron, ... Additionally, we will update investors over the next several days regarding our plans to maintain our long-term credit rating.

    I have asked the board to take this action to address fully and forthrightly investors' questions and concerns, ... Responding to the SEC offers us an additional opportunity to achieve this same goal for investors, and we will cooperate fully. We will also make every appropriate public disclosure during the course of the SEC's investigation.

    Today, there are also buyers and sellers of all these energy commodities, just like there are buyers and sellers of food commodities and many other commodities.

    I don't recall him ever telling me the company was in dire straits.

    Did you have any conversations to get your story straight for trial Uh, yeah.

    My personal belief is that Enron stock is an incredible bargain at current prices, and we will look back a couple of years from now and see the great opportunity that we currently have,

    I was trying to see if they would meet with my lawyers.

    My policy had always been, it's better to talk to the press than not talk to the press.

    We welcome this request, ... We will cooperate fully with the SEC and look forward to the opportunity to put any concern about these transactions to rest.

    Jeff knew full well what he was walking away from. Again, he needed to deal with this right away.

    You'll have lower prices under deregulation than you will through regulation.

    Not only are we ready to go to trial, but we are anxious to prove my innocence.

    I've been a strong financial and political supporter of, first, President Bush Sr. when he was running for president, and even when he ran for president a time or two and failed.

    I did everything I could humanly do during this time. Did I make mistakes I'm sure I did.

    We have been very pleased with the performance of Portland General, ... However, the rapidly evolving competitive electricity market allows us to deliver commodity services and risk management products to our customers without requiring the ownership of a regulated electric utility.

    They can't do without electricity. They can do with less electricity.

    I mean, our primary businesses in wholesale pipelines, utilities, retail, were all doing extremely well.

    It will only take a few brave individuals who are willing to stand up and say it's time for the truth to come out.

    When there's uncertainty they always think there's another shoe to fall. There is no other shoe to fall.

    I was trying to reach Vince Kaminski a long time ago before I even knew he would testify. I was trying to reconnect with Vince, to talk to him about some issues I wanted to talk to him about.

    But certainly I didn't know he was doing anything that was criminal.

    I take full responsibility for what happened at Enron. But saying that, I know in my mind that I did nothing criminal.


    We see ourselves as first helping to open up markets to competition.

    We expect the new water company to be able to finance its own ongoing activities rather than depend on Enron's financial resources.

    Unfortunately, with the multiple inquiries and investigations that currently require much of my time, it is becoming increasingly difficult to concentrate fully on what is most important to Enron's stakeholders.

    Trillions of dollars every day are being exchanged around the world in all of the financial markets.

    We use competitive markets to arrange for delivery of our food supply.

    They had been reviewed and scrubbed quarterly since they were put in place by Arthur Andersen. We thought all that had become history, and it was now news.

    I was just trying to make sure that all of my facts were as accurate as they could be.

    In virtually every other situation, if there were concerns that any of these business activities were not being done appropriately, these concerns would be addressed by a regulatory agency, like the SEC, or as a civil matter in the courts. However, in this case, the Enron Task Force is attempting to criminalize these very same business activities.

    But we have very, very narrow limits on all of our buying and selling of all of our commodities worldwide different kinds of terms, etc.

    I made comments I thought were appropriate at the time.

    Am I a fool? I don't think I'm a fool. But I think I sure was fooled.

    Our liquidity is fine. As a matter of fact, it's better than fine. It's strong.

    We regret Jeff's decision to resign, as he has been a big part of our success for over eleven years, ... But, we have the strongest and deepest talent we have ever had in the organization, our business is extremely strong, and our growth prospects have never been better.

    Well, rates would go up whether you deregulate or not, and of course, the rates that are going up right now on the electricity side are still within the regulated framework.

    I have to take responsibility for anything that happened within its businesses.


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