"Newbies"

Humor

Themes & Topics

Glossary

Lecture Notes

Trivia & Factoids

Themes & Topics
Mergers, Acquisitions, Divestitures, Spin-offs & LBO

1996 in Perspective

1997

1998 In Perspective

• As Art Lovers Duke It Out,Market Prices Reach Records

• Benchmarks' Performance (WSJ)

• How the Dow Components Fared (WSJ)

• Hedge Funds Missed Their Chance To Beat Plain-Vanilla Investments (WSJ)

• Best-Performing IPOs (WSJ)

• Biggest IPOs (WSJ)

• Worst-Performing IPOs (WSJ)

• Mergers (WSJ)

• Top Stories (Fortune)

 

News Stories

Commentary & Opinion

• The Baby Bells bulk up, but they may not be invincible (US News, May 25, 1998)

• The boys in the back room An obscure outfit (Fair, Isaac & Co.) of math-minded Ph.D.s in California is as much responsible for the megamergers in banking as anyone on Wall Street. (Forbes, May 8, 1998)

• Spinoff Means Billions For Ford Stockholders (San Francisco Chronicle, March 4, 1998)

• Why Tech Firms Are Merging Stock slumps bring out the animal in companies (sfgate, January 27, 1998)

Merger Activity

• Aetna buys NYLife unit (CNNfn, March 16, 1998)

• Aetna buys Prudential unit: Acquisition, valued at $1B, creates country's largest healthcare provider (CNNfn, December 10, 1998)

• American Home To Buy Monsanto $33 Billion Deal to Form Life-Sciences Giant (WashingtonPost, June 9, 1998)

• AOL-Netscape (CNNfn Special Report)

• AT&T-BT
  • Special Telecom Report (CNNfn)

• AT&T-TCI
  • Justice Department approves telecommunications merger (San Francisco Chronicle, December 31, 1998)
    
  • Special Report (AT&T) (CNNfn)
  • The merger could deliver on the promise of melding telephones, TVs, and computers (BusinessWeek, July 6, 1998)

• Attel
  • Alltel and 360 Communications agree to $4.1 billion merger (San Francisco Chronicle, March 16, 1998)
  • Alltel dials up 360's number (CNNfn, March 16, 1998)

• BofA-Nations (Also see Commercial Banks)
  • What's the Deal? NationsBank Merger Continues Trend of Power Sharing at Top (WashingtonPost, April 14, 1998)
  • BofA Finally Makes Its Dream Come True Founder wanted nationwide bank since 1904 (San Francisco Chronicle, April 14, 1998)
  • NationsBank Near BankAmerica Deal (WashingtonPost, April 13, 1998)
  • BofA in Huge Merger NationsBank deal to create bank coast-to-coast (San Francisco Chronicle, April 13, 1998)

• BankAmerica Selling Texas Banking Unit (San Francisco Chronicle, March 5, 1998)

• BankBoston to Buy Investment Firm $800 Million Deal for Robertson, Stephens (WashingtonPost, May 30, 1998)

• Bell Atlantic-GTE
  • Bell Atlantic merging with GTE in latest telecom combo (San Francisco Chronicle, July 28, 1998)
  • Companies to offer local and long-distance service to 62M customers (CNNfn, July 28, 1998)
  • CNNfn Special Telecom Report

• Berkshire to purchase General Re in $22B deal (CNNfn, June 19, 1998)

• Bertelsmann acquires Random House (Time, April 6, 1996)

• CBOE-PE

  • Chicago exchange stops courting PCX after DOJ inquiries (SF Chronicle, January 8, 199)

  • Pacific Exchange Set to Merge Deal with Chicago options board (SF Chronicle, July 24, 1998)

• CBT buys Knowledge Well (CNNfn, December 10, 1998)

• Compaq-Digital
  • How the Compaq-Digital deal will reshape the entire world of computers (BusinessWeek, February 9, 1998)
  • Compaq to Buy Digital In Record $9 Billion Deal (SF Chronicle, January 27, 1998)
  • Compaq Makes a Big Move -- and Shareholders Cringe (Barron's Online, January 26, 1998)

• Conrail Breakup
  • Proposal Wins Federal Approval (WashingtonPost, June 9, 1998)
  • Can 2 Systems Be Better Than 3? Skeptics Abound in Conrail Merger (WashingtonPost, June 9, 1998)

• Chrysler-Benz
  • Daimler deal approved (CNNfn, September 18, 1998)
  • Here Comes The Road Test (Time, May 18, 1998)
  • CNNfn Special Report (May 6, 1998)

• Clorox Bags Glad Maker First Brands bought for $2 billion (SF Chronicle, October 20, 1998)

• Coca-Cola buys Cadbury's soft drinks brands outside U.S., including Dr Pepper (CNNfn, December 11, 1998)

• Conoco Debuts At 24 7/8, Up 8% From IPO Price Of $23/Share

  • Also see DuPont to divest Conoco

• Deutsche Bank and Bankers Trust Approve $9.7 Billion Acquisition (WSJ, November 30, 1998)

• Deutsche Post's $1.1B buy of Danzas (CNNfn, December 10, 1998)

• Disney to Buy 43% Stake in Infoseek Corp. (SF Chronicle, June 19, 1998)

• DuPont to divest Conoco
  • Move to spin off energy firm will begin with 20 percent offering later this year (CNNfn, May 11, 1998)

• Excite rejects Zapata's offer of $1.7 billion (SF Chronicle, May 22, 1998)

• EXXON-Mobile (CNNfn Special Report)

• First Nationwide to join Golden State, form third-biggest S&L (CNNfn, February 5, 1998)

• First Union
  • First Union Buys The Money Store $2.1 billion merger broadens bank's niche (San Francisco Chronicle, March 5, 1998)
  • First Union expands loan offerings with $2.1 billion Money Store buyout (CNNfn, March 5, 1998)

• Glendale Goes Merger Route With Cal Fed (San Francisco Chronicle, February 6, 1998)

• Hanshim-Midori (CNNfn, May 15, 1998)

• Household buys Beneficial (CNNfn, April 7, 1998)

• Lockheed-Northrop
  • Lockheed calls off merger (CNNfn, July 16, 1998)
  • DOJ hits defense merger: Lockheed, Northrop say they will fight any attempt to block the transaction (CNNfn, March 9, 1998)

• Marriott Merger Is Approved (WashingtonPost, March 21, 1998)

• Nasdaq-AMEX

  • Newly Merged NASD-Amex Plans Big Changes, Layoffs (WSJ, November 3, 1998)

  • Amex bid for Philadelphia Exchange seen favored over rival CBOE offer (CNNfn, June 9, 1998)
  • Wall Street Revolution Nasdaq, Amex deal may cut trading costs (San Francisco Chronicle, March 13, 1998)

• Northern Telecom-Bay Networks
  • Telecom Giants To Merge Bay Networks bought by Nortel for $7.2 billion (SF Chronicle, June 16, 1998)

• Northwest-Continental: Northwest Territory: 14% of Continental (WashingtonPost, January 27, 1998)

• PepsiCo buys Tropicana: Seagram sells unit for $3.3B in cash to help finance PolyGram acquisition (CNNfn, July 20, 1998)

• Price Waterhouse and Coopers & Lybrand free to combine their books (CNNfn, March 12, 1998)

• Safeway-Dominick's
  • Safeway to Buy Dominick's for $1.85 Billion (SF Chronicle, October 14, 1998)
  • Safeway makes first foray into Midwest market (SF Examiner, October 14, 1998)
    

• Salomon takes Nikko unit (CNNfn, December 10, 1998)
  
• SBC-Ameritech
  • Baby Bells (CNNfn Special Report)

• Seagram-PolyGram
  • Seagram swallows PolyGram (CNNfn, December 10, 1998)

• Sunbeam

  Sunbeam's shopping spree (CNNfn, March 2, 1998)

• Travelers buys $1.58 billion stake in Nikko (CNNfn, June 1, 1998)

• Travelers, Citicorp (Also see Commercial Banks)
  • Can Citigroup get in step? (Euromoney, May 1998; registration required)
  • That's what Sandy Weill calls the megameld of his Travelers Group and John Reed's Citicorp. Can Citigroup's odd couple make it pay? (Fortune, May 11, 1998)
  • CNNfn Special Report
  • $70 million in dreams for sale (San Francisco Chronicle, April 7, 1998)

• Ultramar Diamond Shamrock, Pacific Gas announce $2 billion arrangement (CNNfn, March 10, 1998)

• VW-Rolls Royce
  • VW wins Rolls-Royce nod (CNNfn, June 5, 1998)
  • VW wins Rolls-Royce (CNN, May 7, 1998)
  • CNNfn Special Report (May 6, 1998)

• Washington Mutual-Ahmanson
  • Deal creates state's second largest thrift (San Francisco Chronicle, March 18, 1998)

• Wells Fargo-Norwest Corp.
  • Investors Cool to Bank Deal Wells, Norwest shares slump (SF Chronicle, June 10, 1998)
  • Approaches Differ Dramatically for Merger Partners Wells' high-tech style vs. Norwest's human touch (SF Chronicle, June 9, 1998)
  • Wells Enters a `Merger of Equals' With Norwest, it forms nation's 7th-largest bank (SF Chronicle, June 9, 1998)
  • Two regional banks ink $34B merger to create West and Midwest banking titan (CNNfn, June 8, 1998)

• WorldCom-MCI
  • Shareholders approve $37 billion merger at two separate meetings (CNNfn, March 11, 1998)
  • Concerns Over WorldCom, MCI Merger Mount (SF Chronicle, March 11, 1998)
  • Justice widens MCI probe (CNNfn, March 10, 1998)
  • Background
    • The MCI-WorldCom deal may not be so good for consumers (USNews, November 24, 1997)
    • MCI Takes Offer From WorldCom Offer $37 billion merger is biggest ever (S F Chronicle, November 11, 1997)
    • WorldCom wins MCI Boards agree to $51 per share deal that will create telephone powerhouse (CNNfn, November 10, 1997)
    • WorldCom's Bid for MCI (BusinessWeek, October 13, 1997)

LBOs

• LBO Madness (Forbes, March 9, 1998)
• Texas-tall buyouts (USNews, January 26, 1998)
• Leveraged Buyout Firms Go Tech (Upside, November 10, 1997)
• Tom Lee is on a roll (Forbes, November 17, 1997)

Finance By Example (Archives)

• Olivetti Sells Losing Assets

• Why Are IBM and Sears Selling Prodigy?

• Quaker Oats Sells Snapple at A $1.4 Billion Loss