Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Biogen's Bid for Facet

Earlier this month, Biogen Idec Inc., the Cambridge- Massachusetts based company known for its multiple sclerosis drugs, wanted to acquire Facet Biotech Corp., and has bid $493 million toward that end. That works out to $17.50 a share.

Facet refused the bid, and Biogen threatened a proxy contest.

This seemed to have the effect that an unwanted suitor often does -- the maiden looks about for a white knight. She "lets down her hair," like the gal at the top of the Tower, if the right man is standing beneath. Thus, we get an announcement like this:

Facet Biotech recently announced that it has agreed to amend its rights agreement [i.e. let down said hair] to permit Baupost Group to purchase a number of additional shares without the rights under the rights agreement becoming exercisable. Baupost beneficially owned 3.5 million shares of Facet Biotech common stock on December 16, 2009, which represents 14 percent of the total shares outstanding. The amendment will increase the ownership limit for Baupost from 15 percent to 20 percent of the total outstanding shares of Facet Biotech common stock.

Ah, the ways of love.

2 comments:

Cicily Corbett said...

proxy blah, blah, blah...happy festivus!

Christopher said...

Cicily,

You can fund more seasonally appropriate fare at my other blog. Including, new today, the lyrics to that carol I was struggling to remember Saturday.