Mark was determined to take Azurix public, giving her an independent company far removed from Jeff Skilling. In June 1999, she floated a third of the company at nineteen dollars per share, raising $695 million. Azurix however, was doomed from the start. Water is a localized business that lacks the continent-spanning pipelines and transmission systems that allow natural gas, oil and power to be moved and traded between locations, and could never be traded the same way. The regulated water business has extremely low margins, with utilities making money by cutting expenses to the bone, but Mark took the opposite approach....

Meanwhile, her acquisitions were turning sour. In Argentina, Azurix discovered that its new acquisition did not include the home office, staff or billing system of the existing utility. In a frenzy of maliciousness, departing employees had destroyed office equipment, and billing records were mysteriously missing, which meant people would be receiving water, but Azurix would have no idea who they were or where to send bills. In November 1999, regulators in the United Kingdom ordered a 12% cut in the