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because there's a conflict of interest. I don't recall whether Ralph Lazarus did that--I think Ralph Lazarus said that he didn't think he could participate in the deal personally, because he was the CEO of Federated Department Stores, and they were, in a sense, a competitor.

But, as I was beginning to say, there's no magic about AEA. It's just a group of knowledgeable investors with a reasonable amount of cash and a good staff operation. You could do the same thing--or another person could do the same thing, if you had investors who had knowledge of the things you were looking at and also had the wherewithal to say, “Here's ten million dollars. It's your call. I just want to get a good return on my money.” And they've gotten some handsome returns. Loehmann is one of them.

How is that structured? How are the returns worked? Does each individual member of AEA get a certain percentage of the profit?

I'm sorry, my hearing is--

Does each member of AEA get a certain percentage back of the profit, when the profit is made? How does that work?

Well, you get back in proportion to what you put in. If there are ten people in on a hundred-thousand-dollar deal and each one puts in $10,000, and you sell it for $200,000, then AEA gets some of that. Then the individuals get it in proportion to their original participation. So if there are ten and they each had ten per cent, they'd get ten per cent of the capital gain after AEA gets its part. Because that's how you attract good operators in the AEA staff is by letting them participate in the deals.