Carl Icahn ups his stake in Yahoo


In a move that comes as somewhat of a surprise, Carl Icahn spent the first three days of this week spending $67 million on shares of Yahoo (NASDAQ: YHOO). He bought 6.8 million shares for an average of $9.92 bringing his total stake to 75.6 million million shares -- roughly 5.5%of the company.

Given that Icahn's nemesis, Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang is on the way out, Icahn may be positioning himself to have considerable say in the company's choice of successor. Icahn controls three seats on the company's board of directors.

The market value of the company has taken a beating since Icahn got involved. Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) had offered to acquire the company for $33 per share. Yang spurned that offer and it was withdrawn in May. The stock now sits right around the $10 mark.

Icahn's decision to up his stake in the company signals some level of long-term confidence now that any kind of major deal with Microsoft seems like a remote possibility. But the question shareholders have to ask is, as valuable as Icahn is on matters of corporate governance, does he really have the expertise that will make him a valuable contributor to the internet company's search for a CEO?

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Symbol Lookup
IndexesChangePrice
DJIA-89.2312,801.23
NASDAQ-25.182,902.05
S&P 500-11.481,340.47

Last updated: February 10, 2012: 04:07 PM

Hot Stocks

General Electric

18.855-0.275(-1.44)

Alcoa

10.265-0.375(-3.52)

Apple Inc

493.06-0.11(-0.02)

Google Inc 'A'

605.99-5.47(-0.89)

Bank of America

8.075-0.105(-1.28)

Wal-Mart Stores

61.84-0.12(-0.19)

Exxon Mobil Corp

83.68-1.20(-1.41)

Ford

12.425-0.265(-2.09)

Citigroup

32.895-0.765(-2.27)

IBM

192.09-1.04(-0.54)

Yahoo

16.14+0.14(+0.88)

Starbucks

48.76-0.44(-0.89)

Microsoft

30.47-0.30(-0.98)

Home Depot

45.275+0.005(+0.01)

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 1328908025127 ms.