The failed buyout that helped trigger the 1989 Friday the 13th mini-crash involved UAL Corporation.
UAL Corporation was the parent company of United Airlines. In October 1989, an attempted leveraged buyout valued at about $6.75 billion unraveled after the Association of Flight Attendants withdrew from negotiations over the employee stock ownership plan intended to help finance the deal.
News that the buyout had collapsed spread through markets on Friday, October 13, 1989. Investors interpreted the failure as a warning that highly leveraged takeovers and the junk-bond market were becoming difficult to finance. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 190.58 points, or 6.91%, that day.
The UAL deal was widely blamed as the immediate trigger, but it was not the only source of market weakness. The savings-and-loan crisis, slowing growth, and concerns about leveraged finance were already weighing on investors. UAL is therefore best understood as the headline event that helped ignite the mini-crash, not as its sole underlying cause.