<p style="line-height: 18.9091px;">American Capital, a Bethesda-based private-equity firm and longtime player on the Washington financial scene, has hired Goldman Sachs and Credit Suisse as it puts itself up for sale after a hedge fund slammed it for poor performance and overly generous compensation. American Capital, which calls itself a publicly traded, private-equity firm (ticker ACAS) “has dramatically underperformed the broader market from its pre-crisis peak to current levels,” said Elliott Management, which owns nearly 9 percent of the firm’s stock.</p>