Why Was Harrah's Going Public Anyway?

Harrah's shelved its IPO this morning, citing "market conditions." Apparently, it forgot about the huge black-hole that General Motors GM was. The company must have been living under a rock for the past few months. In a statement, Harrah's “today announced that it is not pursuing its initial public offering of common stock at this time due to market conditions." The company's IPO was going to be a disaster and everyone and their brother knew it. It still has a massive debt load, has no international growth, and is a play on the American gaming scene, which to be honest, isn't pretty right now. Harrah's is stuck with a ton of debt, nearly $20 billion worth. The debt goes out to 2015, but the IPO, which the company hoped to raise around $600 million, wasn't going to pay down debt, it would've been for finishing building one of its casinos. This is a big no-no, and everyone knew it. Hedge funds were coming out saying they were going to be shorting the stock, and long the debt, in what is known as a capital arbitrage structure play. Harrah's did the right thing by canceling its IPO, but this makes me question CEO Gary Loveman and Apollo Global Management and TPG Capital, the private equity firms who took the company private in 2008. The company clearly isn't ready to come back to the public markets, and it may need to alter its business model if it ever wants to come back again.