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Ceridian's buyout hits a speed bump

Tom Taulli — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 17:50:00 EST

This week, the $5.3 billion buyout of Ceridian (NYSE: CEN) has gotten a lot more complex. The company's biggest shareholder, Pershing Square Capital Management, is not happy about the price tag.

More and more, private equity deals are coming under attack by activist shareholders. Then again, it tends to be an effective strategy.

As for Pershing, it has hired the investment bank, Lazard (NYSE: LAZ), to help things out.

Pershing's William Ackman has written a letter to Ceridian shareholders. Basically, he is going to seek out other suitors for the company (including strategic buyers and private equity firms). He would even be amenable to a big-time dividend or a spin-off of non-core divisions.

All in all, Ackman is just trying to get a higher price.

But it didn't have much of an impact. For the day, Ceridian's stock price was up $0.16 to $35.37. The proposed buyout price is $36.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including the Complete M&A Handbook and the EDGAR-Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements.

Ceridian's buyout hits a speed bump originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 13 Jun 2007 17:50:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Newspaper wrap-up 6-13-07: Apple embeds iTunes in Bebo

Eric Buscemi — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 09:15:00 EST

Filed under: Newspapers, Magazines, Apple Inc (AAPL), Fortune Brands (FO), Barclays plc ADS (BCS), Jones Apparel Group (JNY)

MAJOR PAPERS:

William Ackman's Pershing Square Capital Management, whose firms holds about 15% of Ceridian Corporation (NYSE: CEN), doesn't like the proposed $5.3B sale of the company to Thomas H. Lee Partners and Fidelity National Financial Inc (NYSE: FNF), and says he's going to find higher bidders, according to the Wall Street Journal.
The Financial Times reported that British bank Barclays PLC (NYSE: BCS) has drawn up plans to sweeten its $86B all-share offer for Dutch bank ABN Amro Holdings (NYSE: ABN), by substituting cash for some of the shares it is currently offering for ABN.
Beginning today, Apple Inc (NASDAQ: AAPL) is embedding its iTunes internet music download service in the British and Irish social networking site Bebo, reported the Financial Times.

OTHER PAPERS:

The New York Post has learned that a private-equity firm owned by the Dubai government is close to buying Barneys New York from the Jones Apparel Group (NYSE: JNY).
The New York Times reported that the Wall Street Journal is set to "shake up its newsroom" by reassigning and replacing several top editors.
Golf equipment maker Callaway Golf Company (NYSE: ELY) is suing Fortune Brands Inc.'s (NYSE: FO) Acushnet Co, for allegedly violating five Callaway patents for golf clubs, reported the Los Angeles Times.

Newspaper wrap-up 6-13-07: Apple embeds iTunes in Bebo originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 13 Jun 2007 09:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Before the bell 6-13-06: Futures rise ahead of economic data

Melly Alazraki — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 08:01:00 EST

Filed under: Before the Bell, Indices, Economic Data, Jones Apparel Group (JNY)

As interest rate concerns continue across the globe, knocking equities, U.S. stock futures indicate this morning another flat to positive open ahead of some economic news coming out later this morning.

Rising bond yields hurt stocks again yesterday, casing another pullback. The Dow Jones industrials saw another triple digit decline, the third in five days as the benchmark 10-year note hit a 5-year high of 5.27%.

Overseas, Asian stocks closed lower and European equities fell on global concerns of rising interest rates. When interest rates are higher, the cost of borrowing is higher and can therefore affect corporate profits and create a drag on economic growth.

Today, bond yields continue to rise this morning, with the yield on the benchmark 10-year note reaching 5.31%.
After a lull in economic news, today a slew of data is due:

At 8:30 a.m., the Commerce Department will report May retail sales. Economists expect sales to have risen 0.6% in May, compared with a decline of 0.2% in April.
At 10:00 a.m., April business inventories is due and is expected to show an increase of 0.3% in April after a 0.1% decline in March.
At 2:00 p.m., the Beige Book, where the Federal Reserve describes economic conditions in regions around the country, will be released.
Finally, at 10:30 a.m., weekly U.S. fuel inventory will be reported. Oil prices slipped ahead of the report as the expectation is the inventory data would show gasoline stockpiles rose last week.

The lack of economic news these past days may have added to pressure on stocks as there was nothing to take the focus away from rising yields and no news to alleviate concerns. Already this morning futures have changed direction and now point to a higher open.

Corporate news:

The Blackstone Group's initial public offering is set for the week of June 25, although the final date is yet to be set, probably for early that week. The company will be listed on the NYSE with a ticker symbol BX.

A large shareholder of Ceridian Corp. (NYSE: CEN), William Ackman's Pershing Square Capital Management, said it does not support the sale of the company to a consortium of buyers which includes Fidelity National Financial Inc. (NYSE: FNF), claiming the price offered to be too low as the $36 per share offered was low.

According to sources, at least two bidding groups plan to submit offers on Friday to acquire Cadbury Schweppes Plc's (NYSE: CSG) U.S. beverage unit for as much as $15.8 billion. Another possiblity is to spin-off the unit through an IPO.

The New York Post reports that Jones Apparel Group Inc. (NYSE: JNY) is close to a deal to sell its Barneys New York department store chain for $950 million to Istithmar, a private equity firm owned by the Dubai government.

Before the bell 6-13-06: Futures rise ahead of economic data originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 13 Jun 2007 08:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Option update 5-4-07: PPP SGY option implied volatility & share price rallies

Paul Foster — Fri, 04 May 2007 14:02:00 EST

Filed under: Ford Motor (F), Motorola (MOT), Citigroup Inc. (C), Options

Daily Option Update is provided by Stock Options Specialist Paul Foster of theflyonthewall.com.

Stone Energy-(NYSE: SGY) implied volatility, volume & share price Rises. SGY, an independent oil and natural gas company based in Louisiana, will announce EPS on 5/8/07. SGY is recently up $1.79 to $31.72 on unconfirmed takeover speculation. EPL offered to purchase SGY for $52 cash on 5/25/06. On 10/12/06 EPL terminated its merger with SGY. SGY announced on 4/26/07 the SEC ended an informal probe of SGY's proven hydrocarbon reserves. SGY call option volume of 2,816 contracts compares to put volume of 32 contracts according to Track Data. SGY May option implied volatility of 50 is above a level of 31 from ten minutes ago (as of this writing) and its 26-week average of 30 according to Track Data, suggesting larger risk.

Ceridian-(NYSE: CEN) May option volatility increases as CEN rallies on chatter. CEN, an information services company principally in the human resource, transportation and retail markets, is recently up .91 to $35.03. TheDeal.com reported a deal for CEN could be near. CEN has a market cap of $4.93 billion, long-term debt of $83 million and cash & short term investments of $294 million. CEN reported 2006 revenues of $1.56 billion. CEN May option implied volatility of 35 is above its 26-week average of 26 according to Track Data, suggesting larger price risks.

Option volume leaders today are: Dendreon (NASDAQ: DNDN), Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F), Citigroup (NYSE: C) and Motorola (NYSE: MOT).

Option update 5-4-07: PPP SGY option implied volatility & share price rallies originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Fri, 04 May 2007 14:02:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Cramer eyes Halliburton's drop; and names more buyout targets

Jon Ogg — Tue, 20 Mar 2007 16:40:00 EST

Filed under: Analyst Reports, Television, Motorola (MOT), Halliburton (HAL)

On today's STOP TRADING! segment on CNBC, Jim Cramer was out on the road at UT in Austin. On the Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) warning he said this should have been somewhat assumed (we pondered the same thing). The company begins a $3 billion buyback next week. Cramer thinks this is why it's moving to Dubai because it's 60% "levered" to North America. He said he'd buy it. He doesn't think the stock actually needs to be public now.

As far as all of the other buyouts, he has a new list of public companies that should go private: Sysco Corp. (NYSE:SYY) is public and doesn't need to be public. Ceridien Corp.(NYSE:CEN) can avoid its problems if it goes private. Landry's Restaurants, Inc. (NYSE:LNY) reminds Cramer of Dollar General in that it doesn't need to be public. He thinks that LNY can go private and then come back as a public company in each of its units.

On Motorola (NYSE:MOT), Cramer said that Icahn's actions against MOT may be the savior of the company.

Separately, Cramer didn't note today if the New York Post article against him was fair and full of the full disclosure; although we were asking if News Corp (NYSE:NWS) was being fair and balanced itself.

Cramer eyes Halliburton's drop; and names more buyout targets originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Tue, 20 Mar 2007 16:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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