If you have read BusinessWeek's latest story on the Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) saga, then you cannot really know what to believe!
According to the story, Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) remains highly interested in re-entering talks to acquire Yahoo!, and it also says those talks may already be in progress.
Then it says Microsoft may want the whole company, but also might just be interested in the search element.
To this the magazine adds that if none of this works, Yahoo! might go ahead and work out a deal to give Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) a non-exclusive right to either sell its search results or include it in its auctions -- or none of the above.
It concludes that sources think there is a 50% chance a deal will happen. Now that's strong conviction! If a deal happens, they go on to say that the buyout price might be $33, $35, or $37 per share (it closed yesterday at $26.15) but that some compromise might be reached. Gee whiz, a 50/50 shot and projecting some sort of compromise.
Carl Icahn is rumored to be deeply involved in making something happen, but then again management is not interested in his input. "Something will definitely happen soon," says one of the people involved in solving Yahoo's conundrum.
This is all as clear as mud and any investment in Yahoo! is highly speculative unless you are actually at the table, whatever table that may be.
Sheldon Liber is the CEO of a small private investment company and the principal for design and research at an architecture & planning firm. He writes the columns Chasing Value and Serious Money. Disclosure: I do not own shares in the stocks mentioned in this story.
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