The lede in a front page story in todays's FT: "Yahoo bought some breathing space yesterday in its long struggle to remainindependent, agreeing to a ceasefire with Carl Icahn in return for giving up three board seats to the activist investor."
It seems only yesterday that I was talking about Yahoo's "victory" in that effort to remain independent. Actually, it was May 5. How time flies.
I was hardly alone in seeing it as a victory. In fact, on Friday the bright folks at Dealbreaker were referring to Icahn's efforts to press Yahoo into the arms of Microsoft as "sunk."
Apparently it isn't "sunk" at all. It now seems that the pressure for a consolidation is so great that Yahoo needed to buy "breathing space" with three board seats. Hmmmmm.
Well, let that be a lesson to you, cats and kittens. Victory, like fame, is fleeting. Sic transit gloria.
Icahn now has one-third of the nine-member board, and there will be no new drama at the company's annual meeting August 1, simply a ratification of this settlement.
How much time has Yahoo bought? According to the FT: one year. Next summer, either Yang will be able to show that independence has been worthwhile or he won't. If he can't crow by then, he'll be eating crow, and the company will be absorbed into something larger, whether MS is still interested or not.
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