Stuff I’m Reading this Morning…

Templeton’s Mark Mobius sees another 40% gain for the BRIC nations.  (Bloomberg)

What Are The Best Hedge Funds Buying?  Including John Paulson, Steve Cohen, Steve Mandel.  (PragCap)

The emperors drop some crumbs: Goldman and Buffett’s plan to help small businesses.  (Barron’s)

10 Most Annoying Things About This Recession.  (TheDisciplinedInvestor)

What’s Icahn up to with MGM?  (DealBook)

The shortest summary of the life of Adam Smith you’ll ever read.  Good stuff.  (EconomistsView)

Brian Moynihan was grilled yesterday in the House, didn’t represent the BAC very well.  (NYP)

$80 oil could mean big trouble to American families.  (Fortune)

Has the legendary Shangri-La just been found?  (NationalGeographic)

Dear Josh,

It’s me: Josh…the You from 10 years from now, using the latest technology from Google to send an email to you from the future.  Don’t freak out.

Anyway, I’m just writing to let you know that the next ten years will be wacky, but everything turns out ok.  For regulatory reasons, I obviously couldn’t include any market or investing info in this email, but don’t worry, you’ll have your share of winners and losers over the next decade and you’ll be a better person for them.

There are some things I will let you in on, however, that may be helpful to keep in the back of your mind.

First of all, unemployment eventually gets better.  New industries crop up from the ashes of the 20th Century’s industries, just be patient.  Oh, and you may want to brush up on your Mandarin if you’d like to work in any of these new industries.

Second, the entire two-party political system dissolved back in 2016.  The corporate takeover of politics is complete and we are united as a nation under President Dimon.  We now vote for all laws by proxy as though they are corporate resolutions, with an annual meeting for voters (citizen shareholders) held each year at a Hyatt of some sort in Delaware.  When “value” fails to be created under President Dimon’s administration, Senators Loeb, Icahn and Ackman mobilize for the voters.

The High Frequency Trading issue is eventually resolved.  Low Frequency Trading, i.e. Investing, becomes banned and only short-term trading is permitted under the new regulations.  401(k) allocations are now texted in via cellphone from account holders during cab rides to and from their second and third jobs.

Bonuses are now referred to as what they really are: Tributes.  This terminology just made more sense as taxpayers are basically forced to pay them, in constant fear that these irreplaceable execs may up and leave us with no one talented enough to answer emails at a lending institution.  Thus, annual tributes to the nobles are paid, even when corporations find themselves insolvent.  They just get it from the IRS.

The Mutual Fund versus ETF debate is also resolved; Ultimately, two thirds of all gimmicky ETFs are shut down due to lack of assets under management, the remaining ones are acquired by traditional mutual fund families who do what they do best – they market the snot out of them.

Speaking of funds, Bill Miller is in the news lately, he’s currently enjoying his 9th “Comeback”.  Interesting how a guy running a supposed “Value” fund only puts up numbers in a “Growth” market environment.

In a few years, you’ll see Berkshire Hathaway make some bizarre biotechnology acquisitions.  Everyone will scratch their heads at the time, but what ends up happening is that Warren Buffett clones himself for the benefit of his shareholders.  Warren Jr is currently being groomed and schooled in each line of business, from Justin Boots to GEICO. 

Hedge funds are now 100% offshore.  They have all relocated from Greenwich to Greenland, a country with zero securities laws on the books.  This has allowed the enterprising hedge fund manager the freedom to use his “edge”, be it inside information, color, frontrunning, favors owed, political connections or astrology in pursuit of returns.  But they’re freezing their asses off.

Also, you should probably wean yourself off of the Knicks, btw.  Yes, they’ll get LeBron, but halfway through his first NY season, he gets wrapped up in a new religion that doesn’t allow him to play basketball.  The Dolan’s will have to pay him out his full contract unfortunately, so there’s another $200 mil down the drain.  Oopsies!

Your website really takes off soon as well.  There will be numerous offers for you to endorse specific financial products or services for money, but your integrity stays intact.  The Reformed Broker remains forecast-free and incorruptible as a running commentary of the markets.  In a few years, you will even get around to updating that dopey picture of yourself on the “About” page.

Oh, no flying cars yet, but wait til you see (taste) what we put in our engines!  I won’t spoil it for you, but get ready to ROFLYAO.

Gotta go, market’s opening.  Keep fighting Josh, we’re gonna win!

- Josh Brown, November 12th 2019

Photo: Getty Images

Retail financier and small business lending giant, CIT filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Sunday as a last resort to keep its neon hallways open for business, in the fifth largest bankruptcy filing in the history of the U.S. Despite $4 billion invested in small businesses and last year’s $2.3 billion in bailout money, the company will look to ease its (few) woes from bankruptcy with a $125 million loan from Bank of America Corp. and $1 billion from Carl Icahn as a necessary measure to keep CIT’s influence, as the sixth-largest commercial spender, on the economy to a minimum. [WSJ] [Bloomberg]

     CIT is the life blood of many small businesses in the United States, and today, the equipment lender filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy protection. With $71 billion dollars in finance and leasing assets and $65 billion dollars in debt, the CIT bankruptcy filing is one of the largest in US corporate history.

    With the CIT bankruptcy filing, and its trickle-down effect on the business community, is this the next “shoe to drop” in the economic crisis?

For the full CIT story: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091101/ap_on_bi_ge/us_cit_group_bankruptcy

Billionaire Financier Carl Icahn

According to a Reuters article published this morning, Icahn is being very vocal about his opposition regarding the proposed CIT restructure and his hopes that bondholders will reject the current plan allowing the company to go bankrupt. On Tuesday, he offered the smaller bondholders an assurance that he would guarantee the notes if they did not liquidate for less than 60 cents on the dollar. According to the Reuters article:

The company on Friday warned that if bondholders reject its proposed restructuring it would have to liquidate, which could dampen the recovery value of the bonds. CIT said its unsecured bonds would be worth somewhere between 6 cents and 37 cents on the dollar in this scenario.

 

Icahn, on the other hand, said CIT’s proposed restructuring will destroy the value of the company and that the current Board of Directors should not be able to retain control of the company.

 

This Wall Street Journal article journal adds more depth to the offer and Icahn’s concerns:

Mr. Icahn said he believes CIT’s plan will “result in the destruction of value at CIT” and his latest assault is an attempt to “neutralize the variety of scare tactics designed by CIT to coerce noteholders into supporting the company’s plan.”

 

Mr. Icahn, who previously criticized the company using money to “purchase votes for its exchange offer/prepackaged bankruptcy,” is offering an incentive for brokers and financial advisers of $5 for every $1,000 of notes tendered if they convince their clients to support his plan.

 

Bloomberg and Forbes are also covering the story.

Activist investor Carl Icahn has resigned from the board of Yahoo, and is praising both CEO Carol Bartz, who just presided over a quarter of improved earnings, as well as the rest of the company’s board for “acting so responsibly” in conjunction with the search transaction with Microsoft that he advocated.  Icahn’s resignation was to be expected in the wake of Yahoo and Microsoft inking their deal to collaborate on search (and now that talks of a Microsoft buyout of Yahoo are done), but still marks the end of a particularly political Silicon Valley saga.

According to Icahn’s resignation letter, addressed to the board:

“I believe the Microsoft transaction will provide great long term benefits, the potential of which many still do not understand…I don’t believe that it is necessary at this time to have an activist on the Board of Yahoo! and currently, my attention is focused on other matters. As a result, I do not presently have the time that is necessary to devote to the business and affairs of Yahoo! required if a board member is to fulfill his fiduciary duties to the shareholders.”

Icahn has a long-standing pattern of diving into M&A situations between companies, especially high-profile deals, where he typically has a very targeted agenda. He typically scoops up a large number of shares of one of the companies involved, then adds political maneuvering with the board of directors into the mix.

In 2007, Icahn accumulated a large number of shares in Motorola, and pressed for a seat on its board, but was rebuffed by shareholders. He continued to dive in and out of dealings with the company into 2008. That same year, Icahn disclosed that he owned more than 8 percent of the shares in BEA Systems, which Oracle was seeking to acquire. In Icahn’s share disclosure filing to the SEC, he strongly urged that BEA put itself up for sale, and his share acquisitions and actions toward the boards of directors played a significant role in Oracle’s eventual acquisition of the company. It’s also part of Icahn’s pattern in these deals that once he’s done fulfilling his agenda, he’s outta there.

In the saga of Microsoft and Yahoo — a story that was discussed, and then discussed again and again — it’s worth remembering the roller coaster ride that Yahoo shareholders were put on. Microsoft’s offer to buy the company escalated to a price of nearly $35 a share at one point; they ended Friday’s session at $17.22. Icahn’s involvement in an eventual search deal between the companies is just a footnote compared to that series of events that the shareholders in Yahoo endured.

Billionaire activist investor Carl Icahn tells CNBC that the economy is on a “precipice” and the market is “schizophrenic”, but he still sees opportunities in some areas. Icahn says he sees plays in advertising, telecom, the Internet and bankruptcies, but he also says amateur investors need to be very cautious because another downturn in the economy could result in a “bloodbath”. And, he says he doesn’t understand why “any individual in their right mind” would invest in real estate investment trusts right now. In fact, he says real estate offers a good opportunity for shorting.

The annual Forbes 400 list of the richest Americans for 2009 was released this week.  With deep sadness and regret Las Vegas Backstage Access reports that most Las Vegas gaming luminaries have taken multibillion-dollar net worth shellackings. 

Most blamed their financial woes largely on the stock market’s collapse in 2008 and early 2009. 

Las Vegas Sands Corp. founder, chairman and chief executive officer Sheldon Adelson, 76, was the highest-ranking Nevada resident on the list, coming in at No. 26 with a net worth of $9 billion. 

But even that is chump change in comparison to Microsoft Corp. founder Bill Gates who tops the Forbes list with a net worth of $50 billion, followed by financier Warren Buffett, who comes in at No. 2 with $40 billion. 

By comparison, Adelson began 2008 as the third-richest person, but Forbes refigured its list later in the year and Adelson fell to 15th with a net worth of $15 billion. In March, when Forbes released its top billionaire list, Adelson was listed with a net worth of $3.4 billion. 

Las Vegas Sands avoided filing bankruptcy nearly a year ago when Adelson invested $1 billion of his own money into the company to make a debt payment. 

Kirk Kerkorian, the 92-year-old Los Angeles billionaire who owns about 43 percent of MGM Mirage, took the largest tumble of all gaming executives on the list, falling from 27th in 2008 with $11.2 billion, to 97th in 2009 with a net worth of $3 billion. 

MGM Mirage’s declining stock since the end of 2007 reduced the value of Kerkorian’s holdings in the company from $11 billion down to $1.5 billion. Other Kerkorian investments in the oil and automotive industries also suffered throughout the year. 

Wynn Resorts Ltd. Chairman Steve Wynn fell from 118th with $3.4 billion to 141st with $2.3 billion. “Tough year for the king of Las Vegas,” Forbes reported. 

The biggest Las Vegas challenge, according to the magazine, was opening the $2.3 billion Encore last December in the middle of the recession.  

Meanwhile, Wynn cashed out more than $100 million in shares of Wynn Resorts that will be used as part of his upcoming divorce settlement with his wife, Elaine. 

Other Las Vegas gaming industry executives making the list included former Stratosphere owner Carl Icahn, who recently became majority shareholder of Tropicana Entertainment. Icahn was 22nd with $10.5 billion in net worth. 

New York billionaire Donald Trump, who owns the Trump International Las Vegas and 30 percent of the company that controls three Atlantic City casinos, was 158th on the list with $2 billion in net worth. 

Other Las Vegans include Treasure Island owner Phil Ruffin, No. 193 with $1.85 billion, and Silverton owner Ed Roski Jr., No. 236 with $1.5 billion, rounded out the list of gaming executives. 

Hilton Hotels scion Barron Hilton, who earned $800 million when the company was sold to Blackstone in 2007 and $300 million from the sale of Harrah’s Entertainment in 2008, is tied with Wynn for 141st on the list with $2.3 billion. 

Curiously, Las Vegas partier and socialite extraordinaire Paris Hilton, and even her pet monkey were left off the list. 

The only other Nevadan listed on the Forbes 400 is Henderson resident Nancy Walton Laurie, daughter of Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton. She was listed in 118th place with $2.6 billion. 

Three members of Mars family, whose family’s company owns the Las Vegas-based Ethel M Chocolate family, tied for 19th place on the list, each with $11 million in net worth. 

Now, a brief moment of silence for all the Las Vegas  billionaires who have lived gold-gilded lives and lost but a smidgeon of their fortunes– and for the majority masses who can’t even count to a billion, or even write it.

Bails out Realogy, for a steep price.

It looks like the fixer-upper that billionaire investor Leon Black bought in real estate company Realogy won’t be foreclosed on just yet.

The company behind such big names as Century 21, Coldwell Banker and Corcoran Group, came this close to defaulting on its senior debt, but thanks to a deal struck with billionaire Carl Icahn, Realogy was able to pay down its senior loans and give itself some breathing room.

Realogy this week said it raised $515 million in new loans, with Icahn representing 30 percent of that money. It plans to use $365 million of the proceeds to reduce senior debt.

The company’s senior debt had required that Realogy’s debt load be no more than five times its cash flow, but as of the end of June, the company was slightly above that threshold. What’s more, a weak housing market has cut into cash flow, making the need to pare down the senior portion all the more urgent.

Black’s Apollo Management bought Realogy in a highly leveraged, $7.7 billion buyout in April 2007, but the weak credit markets and the mortgage crisis have helped the company to stay afloat.

Icahn earlier this year bought $311 million in Realogy loans at roughly 40 cents on the dollar, and under the deal announced this week Icahn is selling $91 million of that back to Apollo at about double what he paid, according to a source familiar with the matter.

On top of that, Icahn is swapping $220 million of the junior debt he holds for $150 million of newly issued notes that are more secure and pay a higher interest rate.

Long-term, Realogy still faces problems. The debt-to-cash-flow ratio is tested every quarter, and starting in April 2011, the ratio falls from 5 to 4.75.

What’s more, Realogy has only cut its overall debt by $70 million, leaving it on the hook for $6.3 billion that now commands a higher interest rate.

Apollo and Icahn declined to comment. Realogy declined to comment beyond clarifying what was in publicly released financial statements.

From what I read elsewhere, the “senior debt” Realogy paid back was debt Icahn had bought for 0.40 on the dollar and repaid himself yesterday at 0.80. Nice work if you can get it.

Poster inédito de Javier Olivares para Madrid Comics

Finalmente, se ha publicado el texto íntegro de la conferencia de prensa en que se presentó la compra de Marvel por Disney. Clarificado que se respetarán los acuerdos firmados en relación al cine, la futura pelea a cara de perro se dará probablemente con Paramount/Viacom por el acuerdo de Marvel con la cadena de televisión y, especialmente, con Universal en relación a los parques temáticos. Quizás haya algun choque menor en otros sectores como los videojuegos, que no habíamos mencionado en nuestra entrada anterior. Sony parece haberse adelantado a los acontecimientos y renunció a sus derechos televisivos sobre Spiderman a cambio de mantenerlos en espectáculos de acción-real. Hemos traducido cuatro declaraciones de la conferencia que parecen significativas:

Bob Iger – President and Chief Executive Officer, The Walt Disney Company

Se le ha prestado bastante atención a algunos de los acuerdos en los que ha entrado Marvel (…) cuando operas como una sola compañía e integras verticalmente, despejas de la ecuación mucha fricción.

Tom Staggs – Senior Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, The Walt Disney Company

Alrededor de poco más del 50% de los beneficios de las licencias de Marvel provienen del mercado internacional. (Disney) está significativamente por encima del 50%. Así que pensamos que hay una oportunidad real en tomar (bring up) las licencias — las licencias internacionales se incorporarán a la ecuación con el tiempo.

Tom Staggs – Senior Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, The Walt Disney Company

Marvel, debido a su talla, no ha tenido necesariamente operaciones importantes en ciertos mercados en todo el mundo. No tienen necesariamente relaciones directas con algunos de los minoristas clave (…) En lugar de tener relaciones a través de una agencia en ciertos mercados, nosotros tenemos la infraestructura en el lugar. (…) y ahí pensamos que hay una oportunidad a una exposición más amplia para desarrollar estas propiedades.

Declaraciones como éstas invitan fácilmente a la especulación, tal y como hace Rich Johnson en un interesante artículo (via: Álvaro Pons) sobre la relación entre Panini, Marvel y Disney en Italia. Tras explicar como Disney retiró la licencia de sus personajes a Mondadori en este país, se pregunta:

¿Se repetirá la historia a sí misma? ¿Quitará Disney la licencia de Marvel a Panini y continuará su publicación a través de sus propias oficinas en Italia? (…) ¿Irán más lejos y (…) quitarán todas las licencias de Marvel a Panini país por país? ¿o comprarán Panini y obtendrán repentinamente una masiva vía de entrada en el Reino Unido?

En esta línea apocalíptica, Steve Grant de Comic Book Resources (la web que adelantó la noticia) escribe una columna en que, tras recordar como las corporaciones se comportan cuando compran a otras compañías más pequeñas, trae a colación la catástrofe de Ron Perelmann y Carl Icahn al intentar dominar por la fuerza el mercado directo comprando la distribuidora Heroes que acabó dejando a Marvel en bancarrota. El artículo concluye así:

Disney nunca ha entendido los cómics. Tradicionalmente entendieron la consignación de sus cómics. A Dell, a Gold Key, a Whitman, Egmont, Gladstone, Gemstone, Boom!. No está fuera de las posibilidades reales que, en un par de años, alguien en Disney tenga la brillante idea de integrar la compañía en la sede central y disolver la editorial mientras firma con otros editores para continuar produciendo los aventuras de los superhéroes de Marvel.

No compartimos esa hipótesis, ya que de las declaraciones de la conferencia se desprende que encargarán a Marvel los cómics de Disney, lo que no quiere decir que, pasado el tiempo de las alabanzas, no vayan a injerirse en la política comercial de Marvel en el mercado directo y cargárselo definitivamente. No obstante hay un dato, aún anecdótico, que puede invitar a la esperanza y éste es el nuevo dueño de Marvel.

Como decía Rich Johnson, y así titulamos esta entrada: la historia se repite. Bob Iger, el actual presidente de The Walt Disney Company, durante años segundo de Michael Eisner, es sobrino-nieto de Jerry Iger, creador del cómic de Sheena, la reina de la jungla y socio del estudio de dibujantes que Will Eisner montó en los años 30.  El primer artista contratado por Eisner & Iger Studios fue un tal Jack Kirby. Esperemos que Bob Iger no se decida a deshonrar a la familia.

P.S. Mientras, en el universo Egmont, encuentran un cómic tóxico del Pato Donald.

A TODO ESTO: Dinsey/Marvel, Kodansha en América, Sueisha y Shogakukan en Europa ¿donde está la industria del cómic europeo?

]]> http://blog.mdbpartners.com/2009/08/30/three-recent-biotechnology-activist-wins-by-carl-icahn/ Mon, 31 Aug 2009 01:17:41 +0000 Michael Becker http://blog.mdbpartners.com/2009/08/30/three-recent-biotechnology-activist-wins-by-carl-icahn/ http://cgleaders.wordpress.com/2009/08/25/shareholder-activism/ Tue, 25 Aug 2009 13:15:24 +0000 santiagochaher http://cgleaders.wordpress.com/2009/08/25/shareholder-activism/

by Frank Edwards for Public Offering at Columbia Busines School, August 25, 2009.

There is no more basic question in corporate governance than “who gets to decide.” We are moving away from a world where shareholders are small, passive investors to a world where investors hold sizeable positions in companies and want to be heard on vital corporate decisions.

There is a growing movement to give shareholders — especially institutional investors and substantial block-holders such as private equity firms — a larger role in corporate governance. In recent years, we have seen large individual activist shareholders, such as Carl Icahn and Warren Buffett, influence companies’ policies and strategies; activist hedge funds, private equity funds and union and public pension funds have successfully persuaded or forced changes upon recalcitrant managers.

But moving away from the traditional director-primary model raises the fundamental issue of what powers should shareholders have. Will more shareholder involvement disrupt the very mechanism that makes the public corporation practical, which is the centralizing power in the board of directors?

One controversial area is the adoption of majority voting standards. In the United States, the traditional way of electing directors has been by plurality voting in which directors typically are elected if they receive one or more shareholder votes in favor. Shareholders are now demanding that the plurality system be replaced by a majority vote rule, a system used in many other countries, including the United Kingdom. Some American firms have already voluntarily instituted some form of majority voting, while many others are resisting this change…(continue reading)

Stuff I’m Reading this Morning…

Talk radio legend Don Imus is in talks with Fox Business.  (LATimes)

Wonk Wars: A recap of the regulation and markets debate between Greg Falkenstein and Justin Fox of CBS Money Watch.  (Falkenblog)

It’s official: Gawker is calling it the Mancession.  LOL.  (Gawker)

These stocks actually dropped during the big rally.  Losers.  (USAToday)

What’s going on with Carl Icahn lately?  (Clusterstock)

The maths of gambling.  Fascinating stuff.  (NewScientist)

I gave an interview about being a broker during the crisis to my new pal Hiro.  (My10000dollars.com)

Reason number 328 that I love Christopher Hitchens: A slideshow of Chris fighting the power in NYC.  (VanityFair)

Judge ain’t satisfied, no settlement for SEC v Bank of America yet.  (WSJ)

The return of Pee-wee’s Playhouse!  (LaughingSquid)

You probably think that this post will  be about GDP and the recession…in case you didn’t see, GPD, the measure of all goods and services, shrunk less than expected so  the world thinks that its raining gold chips…But this post is about microsoft and yahoo…I know, I know, its been in the news a lot lately…im only making this post so that you will know what they are talking about the next time you see those names in the news and so you can stop wondering if your yahoo email account will go away…I will get something out very soon about GDP

So early last year, there was this big thing going on with Microsoft and Yahoo!…microsoft saw all this money that google was making with their search engine, with about 60%-70% of market share (market share is the portion of the total market currently available in a particular product or segment or sector)…so like any good opportunist or hater (there is a fine line) would, they wanted in on the action…in order for them to get a good head start, they figured that they would try to buy the next largest player, Yahoo!, who at the time had about 16% market share…at first it seemed like a match made in heaven…microsoft wanted to buy  yahoo and yahoo wanted to be bought… but there was jerry yang.  Jerry Yang was co-founder and CEO of yahoo at the time…this guy got into an all-out game of poker with Microsoft and their CEO Steve Ballmer…and ballmer read him like book!…On Jan 31, 2008 the closing price of yahoo was $19.18 and on Feb 1, 2008 microsoft offered yahoo $31 per share, representing a total equity value of approximately $44.6 billion…thats a 62% premium!…but about a week later yang said “no” because he wanted at least $40 per share…so after months of a bunch of back and forth, on 5/3/08, microsoft bumped up the offer to $33 per share and yang said that he wanted $37…unfortunately for yang and yahoo, microsoft withdrew its offer…

There is this guy, or should I say billionaire mogul guy, named Carl Icahn.  He is well known for (obviously) being a billionaire and hostile takeovers…basically, hes been known to buy up all the stock (enough to get a controlling interest – 51%) of a company and force a takeover, hence the term hostile take over (here is a wonderful article about hostile takeovers. if you have questions about the lingo, hit me up)…hes a firecracker…and he sits on the board of a bunch of companies and he owns big chunks of various companies by way of stocks…one of those companies is yahoo.

After the $33 offer, Ichan said that he would try to oust yahoo’s board (shareholders vote on board members) if they don’t reopen talks with Microsoft…to shut him up he got 3 seats on the board, basically giving him more power in the company.

So on November 17, 08 jerry yang stepped down as CEO…and on that day the stock closed at $10.63…on 11/19/08 Ballmer said that Microsoft is “done with all acquisition discussions with Yahoo.”… then the next day, it dropped to its all time low of $8.95…

In Jan of this year yahoo got a new CEO, Carol Bartz…and since then the shares have been up 42%… then in April the rumors started that she and steve ballmer were meeting and discussing possible deals…In the meanwhile, Microsoft launched their new search engine “bing” in June…

On Wednesday, july 29 microsoft and yahoo finally reached an agreement…and I say agreement because the actual terms are nothing like the $45+bln buyout that they were tryna do at first…it’s a Partnetship…In the agreement yahoo will get no up front money and microsoft’s bing will power yahoo searches and yahoo will get 88% of the of the revenue of the web-search ads and wont have to bear any of the costs for the first 5 years of the 10-year partnership…yeah thats right, they didn’t get anything…its funny cause people expected a deal like this to bring in $1.5-$3bln up front…especially after bartz said that she wanted to sell the search unit for “boatloads” of money …yahoo says that the deal will add $500mil in annual income and save $200mil in costs…

Right now yahoo’s 20% market share together with bing will put microsoft/yahoo in the competition at almost 30% to compete against googles 65%

In an interview bartz said

“The priority was not to do the deal, the priority was to get the fog away from the company. Yahoo got pegged as a search company and we’re not a search company. Search is only one aspect of what our customers do.”

Hold up, wait a min…if you are as tech un-savvy as me then you are probably wondering “Errr, really? Search is only one aspect? What else do u do” cause I thought search was ALL aspects of what they did…

Well, the search engine is about 45% of their business while their other 2 main businesses are web-search ads and graphical ads…didn’t know this but oh well…seems they are trying to streamline their business to focus on core money makers

That brings us to today…immediately following the news, the market reacted…yahoo stock dropped 12%…and its still down today, last trading at $14.53, down from $17.22, the day before the deal…

Contrary to my opinion, the market and some analysts out there think that yahoo got the short end of the stick…I think that it was a great deal for both parties

What do you think?

and no, your yahoo email wont go away

As finalization of a Microsoft-Yahoo search deal reportedly nears, activist investor Carl Icahn–who played a key role in trying to broker a broader partnership between the companies last year–is speaking out in favor of such an agreement.

“I’ve been a strong advocate of getting a search deal done with Microsoft,” Icahn, who owns about 5 percent of Yahoo and sits on its board, told Reuters in a phone interview Friday. “It would enhance value if a deal got done, because of the synergies involved.”
Icahn

According to an All Things Digital report late Thursday, several top Microsoft players–including online executives Yusuf Mehdi, Satya Nadella, and Qi Lu–are in Silicon Valley to try to finalize a search deal with Yahoo.

The report says the two sides are “down to the short strokes” after years of closely watched on-again, off-again talks. A deal could come within a week, All Things Digital said.

Icahn, for his part, wouldn’t comment on where the latest supposed negotiations between Yahoo and Microsoft stand, according to Reuters. Icahn was a central figure in Microsoft’s closely watched $47.5 billion takeover bid for Yahoo, which fell apart in November of last year.

During the negotiations, he launched a proxy fight in a bid to take over Yahoo’s board. Among his wishes was that then-CEO Jerry Yang step down. The company and Icahn eventually reached an agreement that got him a seat on the board, and the number of seats was expanded, with Yahoo appointing two new members from Icahn’s slate of candidates.

Since the full-out acquisition fell through, both Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and current Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz have indicated they are open to some sort of a search deal.

As my CNET News colleague pointed out, with Microsoft’s Bing getting some good reviews and Microsoft having billions in cash on hand, the pieces would seem to be in place, if both sides have the will to make it happen.

Ali Jaafar – Variety

Jason Statham is in final negotiations to star in “Blitz,” a London-set thriller about a serial killer targeting police officers.

Lionsgate U.K. is fully financing the project, which is an adaptation of Ken Bruen’s bestseller of the same name. Mandate Intl. will handle international sales.

“Blitz” will be Lionsgate U.K.’s first British project since it announced its plans to beef up its local production last year. It will also mark the first collaboration between Statham and Lionsgate U.K. since last year’s “The Bank Job,” which was a hit at the Blighty box office.

Statham will play a tough, uncompromising cop assigned the task of tracking down the killer. Paddy Considine will play his partner.

Nathan Parker wrote the script; Elliott Lester is directing.

X-Men Origins Wolverine on Blu Ray DVD

Lionsgate U.K. topper Zygi Kamasa, Steve Chasman, Brad Wyman and Donald Kushner are producing.

Project begins lensing Aug. 10 in London.

“Jason and I are excited about the opportunity to be working here again as we are keen to continue supporting British films,” Chasman said.

While its U.S.-based parent company has been the subject of boardroom unrest with speculation over the intentions of shareholder and corporate raider Carl Icahn, Lionsgate U.K. has been gradually ramping up its production activities.

Lionsgate U.K. projects in the hopper include the $15 million contemporary sci-fi thriller “83,” which Noel Clarke will write, direct and star in; and laffer “Stiff,” from “Borat” writer Dan Mazer and producer Andrea Calderwood about a 1980s rock star who falls into a coma on stage and wakes up 20 years later.

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