4 ms·

Yahoo closes $7.6 billion deal with Alibaba Group

41 points by jwuggles 14y ago

randallu 14y ago
Time to start more acquisitions?
lquist 14y ago
Hmm... As an investor, I'd rather capital was reinvested at Alibaba than at Yahoo, though I'd prefer a dividend to that.
- shawndumas 14y ago
  23% still is
freehunter 14y ago
This is kind of a conspiracy theory, but I have to wonder... Mayer came from Google. As we know from recent news about Asus and Android, Google has a big problem with Alibaba because of their Aliyun OS, which Google claims to be an incompatible fork of Android with pirated apps in the app store. I have to wonder if this sale isn't somehow related. Possible Yahoo wishing to distance itself from Alibaba?
- brd 14y ago
  This sale to Alibaba has been in the works for a long time, theres no chance that the Aliyun OS incident has anything to do with it. The timelines just don't match up.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
- nagrom 14y ago
  They're actually retaining 20% of AliBaba, so your theory doesn't hold. More likely, AliBaba's management want to consolidate their independence and see the use of a cash reserve to boost share price as a good thing.
shawndumas 14y ago
I'm confused -- how do the following reconcile: -- Alibaba is paying [...] to buy back Yahoo's 20[%] stake -- Yahoo will retain a roughly 20[%] stake in Alibaba
- RobAtticus 14y ago
  Yahoo previously owned 40%. http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/18/us-alibaba-buyback-yahoo-idUSBRE88H0Y520120918 http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/18/us-alibaba-buyback...
  - shawndumas 14y ago
    ah, thank you.
deveac 14y ago
>Back in May, Yahoo pledged to distribute most of the Alibaba windfall to its shareholders. But after making that promise Yahoo hired longtime Google Inc. executive Marissa Mayer to its CEO. Last month, Yahoo revealed Mayer is considering holding on to the money. If Yahoo! was in my portfolio, I would be furious if they distributed that money to me in the form of a dividend. Well maybe not furious. I'd take it, then immediately sell all my stock on the signal that they are too inept to see that that money would be much better spent on transformative changes and acquisitions in order to turn the company around.
- shawndumas 14y ago
  Marissa Mayer: "The Yahoo! board and management have met, reviewed the strategy with regard to the proceeds, and are pleased to announce that we will be returning $3 billion of the proceeds to shareholders in addition to the 'down payment' of $646 million made over the past few months. This yields a substantial return for investors while retaining a meaningful amount of capital within the company to invest in future growth."
- asdfprou 14y ago
  I definitely agree. Which aspects of Yahoo! would you like to see reinvestment in as a shareholder?
  - deveac 14y ago
    Well, I don't hold it, so I have not done the research and am speaking from a place of ignorance investment-wise. But I am very interested in tech, and looking at Yahoo! in a broad sense I think they need to shift their focus from short term profits to making their core offerings a)more functional for their users, b)more beautiful for their users, and c)integrated with the other services and platforms their users use. I mean, look at their search page. It is literally slathered in adds and links to...god only knows what. Seemingly random news articles? Buttons that say "OMG!" (where will that take me, I wonder?), auto-site links, and hilariously, a 'Trending' section. I almost want to cry. Now think about a search customer navigating to Yahoo! to perform a search, -that's all they want to do. And they see this. Same goes for their mail product. You have users that you are serving, but what you are offering them is just as comically abysmal. It's offensive. It's information overload. It looks like shit. They are, as a company, in a position to better offer some core services like search, mail, photo storage and sharing to an incredibly large audience in a beautiful, user experience enhancing way. I'd love to see them seize that opportunity instead of just slathering their products with garbage to chase short term ad revenue (destroying the user experience in the process and driving people away in the long term), or failing completely to nurture and exploit their better properties like Flickr. Yahoo! needs to get back to basics and fix those things before it starts moving on to grander ambitions imho. They do that, and users will appreciate it. They will stay with them. New users will come into the fold. Stem the flow of users leaving their properties, bring new users in with core service enhancements, then leverage that audience as they expand into areas of what amounts to pure speculation.
dpcx 14y ago
Anyone remember how much Yahoo paid for it's initial stake in Alibaba?
- shawndumas 14y ago
  "Yahoo originally acquired its stake in Alibaba Group in 2005 in exchange for $1 billion and the sale of its Yahoo China business to Alibaba Group." --http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/18/us-alibaba-buyback-yahoo-idUSBRE88H0Y520120918 http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/18/us-alibaba-buyback...

41 points by jwuggles 14y ago

Time to start more acquisitions?

Hmm... As an investor, I'd rather capital was reinvested at Alibaba than at Yahoo, though I'd prefer a dividend to that.

shawndumas 14y ago
23% still is

freehunter 14y ago

This is kind of a conspiracy theory, but I have to wonder... Mayer came from Google. As we know from recent news about Asus and Android, Google has a big problem with Alibaba because of their Aliyun OS, which Google claims to be an incompatible fork of Android with pirated apps in the app store. I have to wonder if this sale isn't somehow related. Possible Yahoo wishing to distance itself from Alibaba?

brd 14y ago
This sale to Alibaba has been in the works for a long time, theres no chance that the Aliyun OS incident has anything to do with it. The timelines just don't match up.
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
nagrom 14y ago
They're actually retaining 20% of AliBaba, so your theory doesn't hold. More likely, AliBaba's management want to consolidate their independence and see the use of a cash reserve to boost share price as a good thing.

shawndumas 14y ago

I'm confused -- how do the following reconcile: -- Alibaba is paying [...] to buy back Yahoo's 20[%] stake -- Yahoo will retain a roughly 20[%] stake in Alibaba

RobAtticus 14y ago
Yahoo previously owned 40%. http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/18/us-alibaba-buyback-yahoo-idUSBRE88H0Y520120918 http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/18/us-alibaba-buyback...
- shawndumas 14y ago
  ah, thank you.

deveac 14y ago

>Back in May, Yahoo pledged to distribute most of the Alibaba windfall to its shareholders. But after making that promise Yahoo hired longtime Google Inc. executive Marissa Mayer to its CEO. Last month, Yahoo revealed Mayer is considering holding on to the money. If Yahoo! was in my portfolio, I would be furious if they distributed that money to me in the form of a dividend. Well maybe not furious. I'd take it, then immediately sell all my stock on the signal that they are too inept to see that that money would be much better spent on transformative changes and acquisitions in order to turn the company around.

shawndumas 14y ago
Marissa Mayer: "The Yahoo! board and management have met, reviewed the strategy with regard to the proceeds, and are pleased to announce that we will be returning $3 billion of the proceeds to shareholders in addition to the 'down payment' of $646 million made over the past few months. This yields a substantial return for investors while retaining a meaningful amount of capital within the company to invest in future growth."
asdfprou 14y ago
I definitely agree. Which aspects of Yahoo! would you like to see reinvestment in as a shareholder?
- deveac 14y ago
  Well, I don't hold it, so I have not done the research and am speaking from a place of ignorance investment-wise. But I am very interested in tech, and looking at Yahoo! in a broad sense I think they need to shift their focus from short term profits to making their core offerings a)more functional for their users, b)more beautiful for their users, and c)integrated with the other services and platforms their users use. I mean, look at their search page. It is literally slathered in adds and links to...god only knows what. Seemingly random news articles? Buttons that say "OMG!" (where will that take me, I wonder?), auto-site links, and hilariously, a 'Trending' section. I almost want to cry. Now think about a search customer navigating to Yahoo! to perform a search, -that's all they want to do. And they see this. Same goes for their mail product. You have users that you are serving, but what you are offering them is just as comically abysmal. It's offensive. It's information overload. It looks like shit. They are, as a company, in a position to better offer some core services like search, mail, photo storage and sharing to an incredibly large audience in a beautiful, user experience enhancing way. I'd love to see them seize that opportunity instead of just slathering their products with garbage to chase short term ad revenue (destroying the user experience in the process and driving people away in the long term), or failing completely to nurture and exploit their better properties like Flickr. Yahoo! needs to get back to basics and fix those things before it starts moving on to grander ambitions imho. They do that, and users will appreciate it. They will stay with them. New users will come into the fold. Stem the flow of users leaving their properties, bring new users in with core service enhancements, then leverage that audience as they expand into areas of what amounts to pure speculation.

dpcx 14y ago

Anyone remember how much Yahoo paid for it's initial stake in Alibaba?

shawndumas 14y ago
"Yahoo originally acquired its stake in Alibaba Group in 2005 in exchange for $1 billion and the sale of its Yahoo China business to Alibaba Group." --http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/18/us-alibaba-buyback-yahoo-idUSBRE88H0Y520120918 http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/18/us-alibaba-buyback...