Gates Trying To Buy Yahoo

[John McKenna]

Microsoft's $31-per-share offer -- $44.6 billion -- represented a 62 percent premium to Yahoo's closing price late Thursday, although it's below Yahoo's 52-week high of $34.08 reached less than four months ago. On Friday, the total value of the cash-and-stock deal fell to $41.7 billion, or $28.95 per share, because Microsoft's shares declined on the news.

Yahoo shares soared to a split-adjusted high of $118.75 in 2000 before the dot-com bust. That peak coincidentally also was just before Yahoo gave Google its first big break by hiring it to run its search engine.

Search engines are crucial tools because they have become a central hub in hugely profitable ad networks.

Advertisers around the world are expected to double their spending on the Internet during the next three years as more people get their news and entertainment on the Web instead of television, radio, newspapers and magazines. The trend is expected to create an $80 billion online ad market in 2010, up from an estimated $40 billion last year.

Read the entire article here...
http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/080201/micro...hoo.html?.v=14

[Dominic J. Maricic]

Yup, unbelievable. This is very risky on Microsofts part as Yahoo isn't doing that well. But MS is 3rd in market share right now for searches so buying #2 could help a little. Unless they continue to go down hill!

[Scott Gilligan, CMI]

Maybe he is trying to buy a search engine that works. MSN Live Search has some pretty piss poor complaints in the webmaster forum.

[John McKenna]

The fact that the Internet ad volume is expected to double in the next 3 years
spells doom for a lot of businesses and success for other.

$80 Billion by 2010 is not chump change.

[James E. Braun, CMI]

What can one of the riches men in the world buy? Anything he wants.