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专栏 - 从华尔街到硅谷

雅虎应该接受整体收购

Dan Primack 2011年12月06日

Dan Primack专注于报道交易和交易撮合者,从美国金融业到风险投资业均有涉及。此前,Dan是汤森路透(Thomson Reuters)的自由编辑,推出了peHUB.com和peHUB Wire邮件服务。作为一名新闻工作者,Dan还曾在美国马萨诸塞州罗克斯伯里经营一份社区报纸。目前他居住在波士顿附近。
根据多家媒体报道,目前雅虎已收到两宗要约,拟收购其20%股权。站在为公司的未来着想的立场上,创始人杨致远应该接受将公司整体(而非部分)出售的方案。

    表面上看,雅虎会作何选择显而易见。董事会往往都会接受更高的出价。但这次情况没那么简单。

    贝恩资本/百仕通愿意支付更高溢价的一大原因是他们并不寻求出售亚洲资产。这样的交易会给雅虎带来几十亿美元的巨额税单——相比低成本基数(阿里巴巴是10亿美元,雅虎日本为零)。有传言称,雅虎将采用“现金充裕剥离”(cash-rich-split-off)方式避免巨额税单,但这样做必须得到阿里巴巴和软银的配合。如果这两家公司正在参与收购多数股股权,它们有什么理由要让收购少数股股权的交易成功?

    当然,反对者会说贝恩资本和百仕通不能给雅虎带来运营“附加值”,因为它们都不是精明的科技投资公司(至少相比银湖资本或TPG是这样)。合理的考量可能是使用杠杆比率。跟我聊过的人都相信雅虎的主要问题是没有重点,也就是说它需要停止大量无谓的努力,重新回到基于内容和电子商务的广告核心业务。

    有时,因为大刀阔斧的业务重组而闹得沸沸扬扬并不是什么好事,但有时这就是医嘱。雅虎可能属于后一类。内部人士认为如果杨致远继续持有10%股权和保留董事会席位,这些事情就无法展开,至少不会有效地推进。而且,感觉雅虎如果退市,可能运营起来会比作为上市公司更好,至少在不远的未来公司试图重组的过程中是这样。

    谈到董事会,我在上周四的文章中已提到过另一个问题:董事会必须全部走人。消息走漏得非常快,这帮人根本不可信。但是只有收购多数股股权才能做到这一点,少数股股权则不能。

    贝恩资本、百仕通和其亚洲合作伙伴也很有可能不会出价。毕竟,我们听到阿里巴巴要竞购可有段时间了,但从未成真。不过,如果他们真的出价竞购,我看不出雅虎董事会除了保住在这家日渐衰落的上市公司的董事位置这点私心,还有什么理由拒绝。

    On the face of it, this should be an obvious choice. Boards should usually take the higher price. But this particular situation goes deeper.

    One big reason why Bain/Blackstone can pay a higher premium is because they are not looking to sell the Asia assets. Such deals would result in a massive tax bill for Yahoo – multiple billions of dollars – given its puny cost basis ($1 billion for Alibaba, nothing for Yahoo Japan). There has been some talk of Yahoo doing a "cash-rich-split-off" to avoid such taxes, but such a maneuver can only be done in concert with Alibaba and Softbank. If those two companies are working on a majority bid, why would they enable the minority bid to succeed?

    The counter-argument, of course, is that Bain and Blackstone would offer Yahoo little operational "value-add," as neither is known as a particularly tech-savvy investment firm (at least compared to Silver Lake or TPG). Legit concerns, as would be the likely use of leverage. But everyone I speak with believes that Yahoo's primary problem is a lack of focus. In other words, it needs to stop lots of extraneous efforts and refocus on its core of advertising via content and commerce.

    Sometimes being known for slashing and burning is a bad thing, but sometimes it's just what the doctor ordered. Yahoo is probably in the latter category, and insiders don't see it happening -- at least not as effectively -- if Yang remains a 10% equity holder and board member. Moreover, there is a sense that Yahoo could operate much better as a private company than a public one, at least in the immediate future as it tries to restructure.

    Speaking of the board, that's another issue I discussed yesterday in a blog post: The entire thing has to go. It leaks like the Titanic, making it reliably unreliable. A majority takeover accomplishes this objective. The minority deals do not.

    It remains quite possible that Bain, Blackstone and its Asian partners won't make a bid. After all, we've been hearing about an Alibaba bid for eons and it hasn't yet materialized. But if it does arrive, I really don't see how Yahoo's board can turn it down for any reason other than self-preservation as directors of a fading public company.

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