Whew! Time to exhale as the drama is finally over. Peyton Manning is signed, Tebow was traded and now Hartford Financial Services Group (HIG) will shed several business units in order to increase its focus on its profitable property & casualty business. While the group benefits and mutual fund businesses will also be retained, the annuity business will… Read More »
After covering Kraft’s (poor) choice in naming its spinoff, we now move onto mocking examining Abbott’s (ABT) choice of the name AbbVie for its new pharmaceuticals company. Sadly, this now means that journalists will have to stop referring to the company as ‘Costello’ which would have been quite the humorous, although ill advised pick. The new name was… Read More »
Since Kraft(KFT) announced last year that it planned to spin off its North American Foods business from its Global Snacks business, anticipation has been high to discover what the two new companies would be named. Well, the wait is over. The company undertook a long and deliberate process Last fall, the company invited employees from around the world… Read More »
It has been a long time since Pfizer (PFE) initiated a strategic review of its business units and in the meantime, there has been much speculation regarding which units the company would ultimately divest and the method of any such divestiture. After months of waiting (kind of reminds me of the Dwight Howard situation, except far less interesting),… Read More »
More spinoff news from the energy space. Atlas Energy (ATLS) recently completed the spinoff of its E&P MLP, Atlas Resource Partners, by distributing ~19.6% of the company or ~5.24m common units on March 13 to shareholders as of February 28th. The new company trades under the ticker ARP. In addition to the remaining 78.4% of ARP’s common units,… Read More »
Mario Gabelli appeared on CNBC yesterday, and among other things, spoke, as he often does, about spinoffs. The CEO of Gamco Investors spoke about his success with recent spins such as Fortune Brands Home & Security(FBHS), Beam, Inc.(BEAM) and Xylem(XYL). Gabelli also spoke about Pepsi(PEP) as a potential split that he likes. Gabelli explained why he likes spinoffs… Read More »
What do you do when your letters and pleas get ignored? Turn them into a presentation of course because pictures and charts are just so much harder to ignore. That seems to be superstar hedge fund manager John Paulson’s approach for turning up the heat on Hartford Financial Services Group (HIG). After having no success writing letters to… Read More »
Activism is alive and well these days. A little while ago, we noted that Barnes & Noble (BKS) was considering its options for its cash burning yet growing Nook business. It seems the company wasn’t alone in that thinking and is now being publicly egged on by Michael Glickstein, CIO of G Asset Management and one of BKS’… Read More »
Who says you have to be a mega-conglomerate in order to pursue a spinoff? Galena Biopharma (GALE), a $46m market cap biotech company, announced that it will spin off RXi Pharmaceutical via stock dividend sometime in the coming months. While the board has not set a final payment date, the date of record will be March 8, 2012… Read More »
Came across a note in Barron’s this weekend that Furiex Pharmaceuticals (FURX) CEO Fredric Eshelman upped his stake in the company by 17,359 shares to a total representing ~12.1% ~21.1% of the company. In case you don’t remember, Furiex was spun out around the time of our site’s launch and we noted some bullish followers of the stock.… Read More »
NovaGold (NG) recently provided an update on its planned spinoff of its Northern Alaska Ambler copper deposits. Since that doesn’t quite roll off the tongue, the new company will be known as NovaCopper. Click here for our earlier article on this topic. Shareholders of NovaGold will receive 1 share of NovaCopper for every 6 shares of NovaGold owned. More… Read More »
Listening to (or reading) company conference calls are a necessary but often painful part of investing. Calls are usually filled with a bunch of numbers, some CEO speak and suck-up analysts (if the company is doing well) so anything out of the ordinary or even somewhat controversial becomes noteworthy. Throw in ‘legendary’ fund manager John Paulson and now… Read More »
Ah, to be an activist investor. Push around executives, demand ‘shareholder friendly’ measures and all this while maintaining the flexibility of trading in and out of shares. After pushing hard for a breakup, Carl Icahn quickly rang the register on a chunk of his Motorola Mobility (MMI) stake shortly after its takeout announcement. Too much work? John Paulson… Read More »
With both the DOJ and EU regulatory body blessing the transaction, Google’s (GOOG) purchase of spinoff Motorola Mobility (MMI) is finally close to fruition. No small feat given the recent failures of some other large deals such as ATT’s (T) takeout of T-Mobile and the NYX/Deutsche Boerse combo. Motorola’s hefty patent portfolio appears to have been the impetus… Read More »
Not all spinoffs unlock value. For one thing, there has to be something of value there to begin with. Spinoffs can sometimes be a tool in the arsenal of those operating in the underbelly of the stock market, promoting stocks with no real business except selling stock. Take U.S. Rare Earth Minerals(USMN). An impressive name, to be sure,… Read More »