Cramer on BloggingStocks: Activists won't win in ZLC, MMC, TGT


Jim Cramer on BloggingStocks TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says managements don't care what they have to say now that private equity's dried up.

The papers are filled with the exploits of activist investors. Richard Breeden takes his stake in Zale (NYSE: ZLC) (Cramer's Take) up to 13% and he wants action. So does Nelson Peltz at Marsh Mac (NYSE: MMC) (Cramer's Take). Meanwhile, Bill Ackman raises his Target (NYSE: TGT) (Cramer's Take) to $120 a share and continues to push for a credit-card sale.

To which I say to all: good luck, this isn't 2007. No one wants to hear from you even as you may be right.

The reason saber-rattling worked last year is that managements believed that in the end, the private-equity guys would back up the hedge-fund activists and the managements would be out of jobs.

That was last year. There's no money for these guys, just bluster, even as in two of the three cases -- Ackman and Peltz -- I believe they are right. (I regard Zale's as way too discretionary consumerish to win here.) Without the private-equity money, all of these companies can just say, "Thanks for the ideas, but we are running things our way."

What's too bad is that Target and Marsh Mac are worth much more than their stocks sell for. But there's no impetus for change.

March Mac just got a new CEO. He's going to take his time fixing things. Target is looking at its cohort and asking, "What the heck is Ackman talking about? We are doing better than almost all of the group. Why isn't he going after J.C. Penney (NYSE: JCP) (Cramer's Take) or Lowe's (NYSE: LOW) (Cramer's Take) or Macy's (NYSE: M) (Cramer's Take)?

So, if you are in for these guys, I say, be like management.

Forget about it.

Jim Cramer is a director and co-founder of TheStreet.com. He contributes daily market commentary for TheStreet.com's sites and serves as an adviser to the company's CEO. At the time of publication, Cramer had no positions in stocks mentioned.

RELATED LINKS:

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Symbol Lookup
IndexesChangePrice
DJIA+49.5712,850.80
NASDAQ+24.322,928.20
S&P 500+7.731,350.37

Last updated: February 13, 2012: 10:17 AM

Hot Stocks

General Electric

18.955+0.08(+0.42)

Alcoa

10.42+0.13(+1.26)

Apple Inc

501.15+7.73(+1.57)

Google Inc 'A'

613.72+7.81(+1.29)

Bank of America

8.275+0.205(+2.54)

Wal-Mart Stores

61.92+0.02(+0.03)

Exxon Mobil Corp

84.06+0.26(+0.31)

Ford

12.63+0.19(+1.53)

Citigroup

33.54+0.615(+1.87)

IBM

192.77+0.35(+0.18)

Yahoo

16.175+0.035(+0.22)

Starbucks

48.98+0.16(+0.33)

Microsoft

30.695+0.20(+0.66)

Home Depot

45.69+0.36(+0.79)

DailyFinance Headlines

Benzinga Headlines

TheFlyOnTheWall.com Headlines

BioHealth Investor Headlines

WalletPop Headlines

DailyFinance BlackBerry App

My Portfolios

Track your stocks here!

Find out why more people track their portfolios on AOL Money & Finance then anywhere else.

BloggingStocks Partners

More from AOL Money & Finance

BioHealth Investor Headlines

Page Loaded in 1329146248443 ms.