Texas Industries and others

1. What happened with Texas Industries?

Texas Industries (TXI) the supplier of cement and other building materials (not to be confused with Texas Instruments) held its annual meeting of shareholders Thursday October 22d.

Yesterday, the Inspectors of Election certified the results. [Wait for it. Isn't this moment exciting? I feel like I'm ripping open an envelope for you.]

The results represent a sweeping victory for the dissidents, led by Shamrock. Their three nominees were elected to the board, and their resolutions passed. The three new directors are: Marjorie L. Bowen, Dennis A. Johnson and Gary L. Pechota. The resolutions involved: the declassification of the board of directors; the submission of the company's poison pill plan to a vote of shareholders next year.

2. Evidentiary Ruling from the trial of Matthew Tannin

Meanwhile, the trial of Ralph Cioffi and Matthew Tannin on securities fraud charges moves ahead in the US federal court for the eastern district of New York.

It intrigues me that Judge Frederick Block has ruled that the jury cannot see a personal email Tannin wrote in 2006 expressing anxieties about work and the state of the market. Tannin had written an email to himself, in which he said, quote "we could blow up". I haven't had the chance to do more than scan Block's ruling, which is 21 pages long, but it seems to have focused on the scope of the warrant that was used to seize these e-mails, which "did not, on its face, limit the items to be seized from Tannin's personal email acount to emails containing evidence of the crimes charged in the indictment, or, indeed, any crime at all. It was, therefore, unconstitutionally broad ...."

3. Carl Icahn Quits the Yahoo board.

Icahn has left the Yahoo! board of directors. He first assumed his post there back when he was pressing then-CEO Jerry Yang to accept a takeover bid from Microsoft. That didn't happen, and meantime Icahn's attention has wandered to the CIT matter.

On CIT: Icahn has announced a 30 day tender offer for small CIT bondholders' securities at 60 cents on the dollar. Here's what Bloomberg has to say.

Can I find some connection between any one of these points and the year 1987? What was Icahn doing in '87? I'd like to use that year as a post label again.