Yahoo To Reject Microsoft Bid 302
Many outlets are echoing a subscribers-only report in the Wall Street Journal that Yahoo's board has decided to reject Microsoft's takeover offer. The NYTimes offers the only other independent reporting so far confirming this claim. The report says that Yahoo will formally reject the offer in a letter on Monday, since they believe it "massively undervalues" the company. Microsoft offered $31 per share, a 62% premium on the stock price at the time, for Yahoo; but the latter believes that no offer below $40 per share is tenable. The AP has some background on Yahoo's options in responding to the bid.
Good to have more search engines (Score:4, Interesting)
Idiots (Score:4, Interesting)
That means they don't make money. At least not compared to the already-inflated value of their stock. The value of their shares should be down in the single digits right now based on their income -- a P/E from 15-20 would be much more reasonable. Microsoft comes along and offers to buy them out for an amazing amount of money, and they turn it down?
Refusing this deal borders on illegal, assuming their job is to act in the interests of their shareholders.
It was always going to happen (Score:3, Interesting)
The other main option, namely attempt a takeover by proxy by trying to fill the Yahoo board has now (broadly) been nullified. If the current board is taking a position that will (if the takeover happens) make YH shareholders more money then they are not going to vote on MS stooges who would immediately accept the MS offer.
Well, that took long enough.. (Score:4, Interesting)
This is backwards. Give it five or ten years, and Yahoo could be buying microsoft (and not just because Yahoo's value is going up.)
But Yahoo's value would plummet by at least 75%, according to my completly random guess, if it were a division of MS. Imagine if your yahoo mail account was suddenly an MSN account. Your Yahoo IM suddenly merges with MSN. They both become worse than trash - I cannot imagine an organization (aside from the current executive branch of the us government) that I trust less than microsoft - all incompetence aside.
If they were people, I would invite Yahoo over to a backdoor bbq. MS, on the other hand, I'd invite to.. nowhere.
- d
This is done (Score:5, Interesting)
My bet... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Well, that took long enough.. (Score:4, Interesting)
It is compatibility problem really (Score:5, Interesting)
Companies are not compatible with each other. Yahoo is a open source powered services giant. MS is Windows maker who struggles to make Windows more credible in large installations. Would MS pay $46 billion to further advertise open source technologies and operating systems like FreeBSD?
I suggest Slashdot people who thinks Yahoo is lame because of their homepage check http://developer.yahoo.com/ [yahoo.com] to see what Yahoo actually is.
Re:Not smart (Score:2, Interesting)
Its not that hard to be a stock vampire. If you had $1,000 and bought 1,000 shares at $1.00 and then just waited for an invariable 5% change price to $1.05 then have a limit sell then you just made 50 some odd bucks. This may seem small but if you do it at larger scale and of course higher returns you can scale it up to higher returns. Your not even waiting for a quarterly return nor news but rather brute forcing money out the company and other investors over and over again as your ride the price changes.
Of course if the whole market collapses like it did in January that one day, you might be out of a lot of money if you were trying something like this.
I'm not saying its good or bad, but the current system leaves open a few loopholes so that a company can be exploited by investors bleed it dry of money. However, generally companies that give dividends tend to keep those kind of investors at bay by simply having enough long term investors soaking up the dividend returns over several years.
Re:Ballmer: "Google's not a real company..." (Score:5, Interesting)
Any tech company can be called a "house of cards". After all, what real assets do they own other than some buildings and equipment? The value of a tech company isn't measure that way. The foundation is the people they have and the talent pool they can draw from. Google has an immense talent pool that has shown itself being capable of solving many, many problems that bring value to people's lives. Advertising is just one avenue they use to monetize that value.
Re:Ballmer: "Google's not a real company..." (Score:3, Interesting)
Right now they've got Steve Ballmer in a corner. This is a man who is driven to win at all costs. Despite the flury of lawyers and PR folks advising against a hostile take over, I can't see him backing down. His identity and authority is too closely linked to his gratification.
Yahoo has no choice but to try to work out some sort of partnership with Google, if only for its own survival. Fortunately, I do not see a way that Microsoft can ever "beat" Google. Google has more raw talent.
Re:It is compatibility problem really (Score:3, Interesting)
No, but it might be worth $46 billion to destroy one of the larger installations of open source software out there, in addition to starving open source projects like Zimbra of corporate support.
Re:Ballmer: "Google's not a real company..." (Score:1, Interesting)
I don't deny that being any CxO of a company doesn't come with its own set of stressors but some people are better at handling those stressors than others. Some children handle stress at home by being bullies at school while some kids when they grow up will take up boxing instead of beating up on an innocent bystandard. There are ways to deal with anger and many people that have issues with it express it physically (throwing chairs anyone?). But there are verbal ways to express it as well and obviously Ballmer has issues with that too. Unless you just don't care you can control your anger and what you say in public as opposed to a private business meeting, as opposed to how you talk to your wife and kids at home (or in public for that matter). It is called decorum. Some people have it and some don't. Those who are in the public spotlight should have more than most people because they are representing a company. Shareholdres, customers and employees (both existing and potential) take notice of those things.
Re:Of course it's not a "real" company... (Score:3, Interesting)
Ten years? Try thirty.
Re:Not smart (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm poor. I make under $30k a year and live in Los Angeles. Yet despite that, I am able to save 25% of my income each year and invest it, some of it in oil stocks to help offset the cost of commuting. The problem in this country is not that poor people cannot save and cannot live a decent life, it's that they choose not to. They choose to have children before they can afford it. They choose not to take out loans to go to college. They choose to rack up huge amounts of credit card debt and only make the minimum payment each month. I have no sympathy for these people, when I with the same paycheck can live a decent life and take steps to grow my wealth rather than squander it.
This isn't the 1890s, its not just the "high and mighty rich investor" that can make money of the stock market. If you can save $100 a week, you have no excuse for not partaking in the the profit making, and you are reckless for not doing so.
Re:Excuse me? (Score:2, Interesting)
Here is their balance sheet:
http://www.microsoft.com/msft/reports/ar07/staticversion/10k_fr_bal.html [microsoft.com]
It shows that $17 billion in short term investments you are talking about. Here is the breakdown of their investments:
http://www.microsoft.com/msft/reports/ar07/staticversion/10k_fr_not_02.html [microsoft.com]
It shows about $7 billion of common stock and equivalents, none of which is categorized as short term, and about $19 billion in various bonds and similar instruments, of which there is about $17 billion that is categorized as short term. None of that $19 billion is Microsoft stock.
None of this mentions the $10 billion in unrecognized revenue that they have lying around. This is money that they have promised to pay themselves later on in the year.
Microsoft enjoys an excellent cash position, and has large amounts of continuing operating income.