Deals that smell bad.

This article reports that more and more takeover deals are being torpedoed by toxic waste liabilities in the U.S. According to Robert O'Brien, head of leveraged buyout lending for Bankers Trust Corp., five or six years ago environmental liability was a technical point people dealt through. Now it's a major consideration. The new awareness of toxic waste is changing the way businesses are bought and sold, and corroding stock prices in chemicals and other manufacturing industries. Wall Street is scrambling to figure out which companies are sitting on hidden toxic liabilities and who will pay. The estimated cost of cleaning up the nation's 10,000-plus toxic waste dumps: a staggering $500 billion over the next 50 years.