Yahoo protest gets one week
5:00AM
Thursday May 08, 2008
By Stephen Foley
Yahoo has given furious shareholders barely a week to organise a protest vote over its rejection of Microsoft's takeover offers, setting a May 15 deadline for putting resolutions to its annual meeting.
The tactic - after Yahoo had repeatedly delayed setting a date for the meeting, in order to thwart a hostile bid from Microsoft - added to the discomfort of shareholders still reeling from Microsoft's decision to walk away from bid talks at the weekend.
It was announced amid speculation that talks with Google, a key plank of Yahoo's defence strategy, were headed nowhere, reducing further the options available to Jerry Yang, Yahoo founder and chief executive.
Yahoo shares recovered some ground yesterday as shareholders bet that Microsoft still wants to acquire the company, having put a US$46.5 billion ($59 billion) bid on the table during a meeting last week between Steve Ballmer, Microsoft chief executive, and Yang.
The stock rose 5 per cent to US$25.59, compared to the US$33 Ballmer had offered.
The Yahoo board, and Yang in particular, were given a public tongue-lashing by Gordon Crawford, portfolio manager at Capital Research Global Investors, which owns 6 per cent of Yahoo.
Crawford told the US media that he was "furious" and "disappointed" given that he, and other shareholders he had spoken to, would have been willing to sell at US$34. Yang told Microsoft that US$37 was his price.
Although his decision to comment in public is highly unusual, it was unclear whether Crawford would join the campaign to oust the board at the annual meeting on July 3. Small shareholders are trying to foment a rebellion and offer a slate of new directors to take over and restart talks.
Yang is under significant pressure to justify his assertion that Yahoo can once again be worth US$37 a share. However, a tie-up between Google and Yahoo - touted during the protracted talks of the past few months as one way to boost the Yahoo share price - appeared to be suddenly off the cards yesterday.
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