The Industry Standard - MSFT sticks to its guns, cuts bid in 30 days - Comments

Ouch. Bitten by the early

Daniel Fort — Thu, 01 May 2008 09:14:41 -0700

Ouch. Bitten by the early judgement. I was hedging this one, and what a sweet taste of risk it was.

Specifically, it was Kevin

Bradley Baker — Thu, 01 May 2008 08:43:58 -0700

Specifically, it was Kevin who did it.

@Eric - besides the

Daniel Fort — Thu, 01 May 2008 04:39:33 -0700

@Eric - besides the big-gorilla-on-the-block, B. Baker? Though I'd swear Railsback was closer to being able to yesterday.

P.S. - the reply notification is appreciated.

=) Just not enough time

Kevin Railsback173773 — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 23:57:15 -0700

Just not enough time lately to go through all of the open predictions, but this one seems very unlikely to me.

Kevin

Actually, there is one.

Eric Hill684799 — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:32:00 -0700

Actually, there is one.

Point of fact - at current

Daniel Fort — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 17:38:59 -0700

Point of fact - at current standings no one else *could* do it.
(for the historical record)

Eric Hill684799 — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 15:51:13 -0700

Two mil is a hefty chunk o' change not many could afford to do. Impressive.

Amazing what someone

Bradley Baker — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 13:34:27 -0700

Amazing what someone dropping $2mil into a prediction will do to the percentages....

Thanks, appreciate the

Bradley Baker — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 22:30:38 -0700

Thanks, appreciate the clarification.

Bradley -- thanks for the

Josh Dilworth270852 — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 13:53:00 -0700

Bradley -- thanks for the clarification -- that is a really good point. To be more specific, the prediction is for Microsoft to cut i.e. reduce its bid. "Cut" does NOT mean walking away entirely. We went back and re-read the original SAI piece that this prediction references, and that articles assumes the same. Conceivably, MSFT going away entirely would be viewed by Yahoo! brass as a good thing (given what we've heard around the blogosphere). But regardless, the idea behind this prediction is that MSFT will call Yahoo's bluff -- and if MSFT really truly walks away, it is abandoning any leverage that it has in calling said bluff. Sooo. . .that's a log way of saying that MSFT walking away entirely (without having first offered a reduced price for Yahoo) will not be grounds for favorable judgment. Now, there is an unlikely scenario that MSFT will walk away from the deal, and then come back after a long-ish period of time with a reduced bid as compared to the original one. As long as this happens before the prediction close, it will still be grounds for favorable judgment. That is, "cutting" the bid is the same as killing the first bid and making a new and separate bid for a lower price, regardless of the amount of time passing between the two events, so long as they happen by May 5. Thanks for helping us out!

Clarification question: If

Bradley Baker — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 15:11:10 -0700

Clarification question: If MSFT drops it's bid and goes away does that count as "cutting" its bid? Different parts of the title text use each bit of terminology.

I.e. Is the idea a reduced bid only, or does taking the current bid off the table (other than by increasing it) count as success?

MSFT sticks to its guns, cuts bid in 30 days

The Standard — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 14:51:12 -0700

The WSJ has it that at least privately MSFT has offered as much as as $32 or $33 per share, well above the $29.12 value of its original cash-and-stock offer as of Tuesday's market close. MSFT did not in fact cut its bid, but raised it. We had some internal debate as to the nature of public vs. private offers, but we're taking the WSJ to have a trustworthy source, as they have throughout this whole ordeal. --The Industry Standard

There's a whole new round of back-and-forth in this saga as of this morning with Yahoo's retort, which has some prognosticators saying that the company bought itself some time, pending their earnings announcement.

However, Henry Blodget over at SAI makes a good point that:

"Given Microsoft's clear warning and advance notice of a bid cut, Yahoo's board is presumably risking significant legal liability if it refuses to even engage with Microsoft."

This is a prediction that MSFT will actually act out its threat to drop its bid in 30 days, and assumes therefore that Yahoo! refuses to come to the negotiating table in a way that MSFT finds acceptable in the same time period. The grounds for judgement, however, will ONLY have to do with MSFT cutting its bid within 30 days -- its reasons for doing so lie outside the scope of this prediction, given the innumerable twists and turns that this saga is sure to take between now and then.