Yahoo's board ..or someone there, is / are, very astute at "talking up the bidding"..via the media..

Google would simply become too big, they already are by most accounts. I do not see Google owning yahoo as healthy for anyone but Google.

I play fantasy ball on Yahoo, it's a well oiled (and free) system, and would not do so on Google because I have financial interests with adsense/adwords and do not mix business and pleasure (with the same company). The more areas Google tries to dominate the fewer options I have left if they succeed.

I'm with Leo ~ this is big time finance maximizing the value of the house before it goes on the market. Someone or some group is holding a bunch of Yahoo stock and will make a ton of money on this speculation, if anything involving Google comes of it, which is unlikely given the obvious monopolistic overtones.

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Is it any different that MS has had a finger in Yahoo for the last couple of years?

To me Yahoo is a lame horse & anyone that tries to cure it will lose a lot of money.

Yahoo is a lame horse

I don't know ~ I would love to be a big-time financier that could invest at a level where I could help guide a company's path, because I think Yahoo has a lot of life and potential. I use both gmail & yahoo mail pro, and Y is far better; Yahoo news (especially financial) is at or near the top for much of the public; when I'm looking for images, I find Yahoo easier to use and every bit as effective as Google (and Bing is better than Google); I'd resurrect Y directory as a primary gateway but with more of a social networking aspect, so people within niches could have their own pages which pointed to their own websites. So to my eyes, there's life in the old Stewball yet.

Listen to... Old Stewball [youtube.com]

A person or group with really serious money and a flare for risk should buy a controlling interest in Yahoo AND AOL (could probably get them at a bargain), integrate the two, bring in a Steve Jobs level visionary (if there are any left), hire the very best cutting-edge managers, designers & programmers, eliminate redundancy and deadwood, hire the most innovative PR firm, and do a full frontal assault on Google. Get in their face every day. Make it a war ~ the press would love it, like Apple & MS in the old days. Things would get very interesting very fast. It won't happen, but oh man, would I love to see it....

;)

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I'm with Leo, too.

It really is a most unlikely scenario, even though it would give momentary joy to the Google Haters ("There! We Told You So!" [yawn]).

Yahoo!'s services are too close to many of Google's for it to be allowed to happen, even if Google wanted it (why would they?) If the US didn't block such a deal, Europe certainly would!.

And Yahoo!'s finances are too close to M$ for them to allow it to happen.

Yahoo! is a mess; it peaked several years ago, and like all dot com has-beens, it's spiraling slowly down to ignominious defeat. I don't celebrate that; but it's a fact.

Stories like this usually come from overpaid and overconfident public relations idiots, secure in the knowledge that they will get paid, whatever damage they inflict on Yahoo! and its chances of a sensible deal with some non-Google company.

Having said all that, anything's possible. There is an outside chance that Google is engineering an asset-strip that would let them have something ... patents, for example ... while someone else picked up whatever's left. But it's very unlikely. Yahoo!'s value is in its users; break up the company, and the residual value is minimal. Like most Internet companies, the whole is infinitely more valuable than the component parts.

Don't bet your farm on it. AP - Associated Press - is where lots of yellow journalism, propaganda and untrue stories are being fed into the whole "Mainstream" "Media".

IMHO someone's playing a game here. The only players left who could buy Y! is MS and some money printing entity like Goldman Sachs through its thousands of affiliate "foreign investor" companies. Google? will probably be blocked from doing so by the .gov

Agreed. the government would never allow this to happen.

LOL.

Google has ~$43 billion in cash and short-term investments. I'd rather see them buy Yahoo! than something more important and strategic. Perhaps it is just a ploy to get MS into making a bad investment.

Yahoo! should stay independent. Shareholders should back-off (I own about 400 shares of Yahoo! and I'm upside down about $3,600). Why does Yahoo need to sell? They have ~$2.1 billion in cash and short-term investments. About 20% of the revenue drops to profit. So why sell?

"someone's playing a game here"

Maybe G, the same game they played with patents earlier in the year--ie driving up the price for the real buyers. As y'all said, EU would certainly block G+Y.

PLEASE dont let google buy yahoo, then I have to get a new email which I had for 10 years.

Why does Yahoo need to sell? They have ~$2.1 billion in cash and short-term investments. About 20% of the revenue drops to profit. So why sell?

Because Yahoo! has halved in value over the last year, and next year will be as bad (or worse). Exactly why Google wouldn't touch it with a barge pole - but would be happy to see someone else waste, sorry, spend, their money.

If you have shares, be advised that it is only the prospect of a sale that is holding the price up; one more farce like the Y-M$ broken engagement, and Y! shares will hit a new low - and stay there.

In fact, it wouldn't surprise me at all to find that the current round of rumours has been set up to keep the share price up - probably by someone anxious to get out before it's too late.

People knock rats for leaving sinking ships - but they'd be pretty poorly advised to stay on board.

I believe there are a handful of qualified buyers interested in Yahoo!, Google "may be" one of them.

Yahoo Has More Options Than Sale of Company, Co-Founder Jerry Yang Says
Wed, Oct 19, 2011 - [Bloomberg.com...]

Yahoo Has More Options Than Sale of Company, Co-Founder Jerry Yang Says

What else can the poor guy say?

I'm sure there's plenty of interest in buying Yahoo! - but how much interest at the asking price (half of last year's asking price)?

How would this even work if they buy their results from Bing?

Yahoo's relationships in China would be of interest to Google.

yahoo's down, but they've got a brand name and some level of traffic. I believe there's still some possibility of them rising from the ashes.

Say if Facebook bought them and integrated yahoo search into facebook. Who'd ever leave facebook if they could search the web directly from their wall?

Yahoo's relationships in China would be of interest to Google.

I doubt Google would be able to use that to any advantage. They're still Google, they'll never be forgiven to standing up to the Chinese government (not much resistance, granted. But more than anyone else). Yahoo!'s subservience to them would be a problem to Google, not a boon.

I believe there's still some possibility of them rising from the ashes.

Can you name one Internet company that has fallen so far and risen again? OK, one or two have 'survived', usually with new owners, but I can't recall one who was once dominant (or close to), fell, and rose again to anything close to its previous glory.

Except Apple :) But they never lost their kewlness; Yahoo! has.

Except Apple :) But they never lost their kewlness; Yahoo! has.

This is at the essence of the Yahoo revival. In a world where form exceeds function, it is essential to appear "cool" to get the huge & consistent traffic stream that defines success, especially from the under 30 crowd. To be cool a site must be cutting edge and yet easy to use; it must offer significant benefits for free but with optional unintrusive paying features to generate income; it needs a buzz that goes viral. Again I say, I think Yahoo has a window of opportunity to pull off a revival (the Facebook idea from wheel would be a game changer). Google does not appear that "kewl" anymore, and if anything, is stepping onto a slippery slope with the awful SERPs and ever increasing real estate devoted to ads. MySpace went that route, and fell like a stone. FB picked up those members and never looked back. But if Yahoo cannot revitalize themselves soon, they may be joining AOL and MySpace as burnt out hulks on the side of the cyberhighway. I'm pulling for them to get a buyer with a real vision, but if Google gets involved (even "indirectly"), they are deader than dead.

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But that's my point.

You can't buy 'kewl', and nothing old has a cat's chance in a dog show of 'becoming' cool. You've either got it, or you haven't. Yahoo! hasn't, in spades.

Yahoo!'s undignified exit will leave a space that could be exploited by a newcomer; with Google's fall from grace, they may well walk into the 'kewl' vacancy in these parts ... but Yahoo!? come on!

I'm just not convinced that it is out of the realm of possibility (note I am not saying "likelihood"!). The best PR firms have brilliant campaign creators that can sell ice to the eskimos. Evidence ~ look at the junk they sell the public on a daily basis! These people are wizards in their ability to convince the public to buy "New Tide" for the umpteenth time.

And as you said, Apple pulled off their resurrection with the "Think Different" media blitz 20 years ago.

But admittedly it would be a longshot, and would not be cheap. They'd need to employ new & very hip spokespeople; new & very eyecatching interface; the kind of media commercials that people tell their friends about; designer Yahoo t-shirts, bookbags, ballcaps; joining with other cutting-cut partners for a full & unrelenting assault on the status quo (read: Google); daily stories in the press playing up the rivalry.

They have to make it a WAR and fight it on all fronts. They may in fact fail, but they'd go out with a bang, not a whimper ~ a more noble end for a one-time contender.

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They may in fact fail

But for the money someone would have to spend trying to raise the dead, they could invest in two or three 'new' projects, with more chance of success.

And Apple never lost their 'kewl' - They had people who would die for them, all through the bad times.

There's no room for sentiment in business; no-one will risk - and big risk - millions on Yahoo! for nostalgic reasons. It just ain't gonna happen.

Don't get me wrong; I've nothing against Yahoo!; I'm just a cynical old realist.

Search Engines are genderation specific.

no-one will risk - and big risk - millions on Yahoo! for nostalgic reasons.

Again, just to be clear, I'm not saying it is for nostalgia, I'm saying it is for the big enchiladas ~ the $$ to be realized if it can be pulled off is mindboggling. Just look at Google's quarterly profits. We're talking Big Time money. Yeah, Yahoo may have one foot heading for the grave, but they are not in it yet, and in the meantime, they have links pointing to them, they have name recognition, they have infrastructure, et al. I agree they lack "cool" and I'm also saying they lack vision. But money changes everything, and there's a lot of gamblers out there who would get a rush from rolling the dice. I hope someone will do it because I'm itching to see a knock down drag out fight with Google. Even it is a fight to a draw, it'll pay for itself many times over. But the only chance is with money & vision & committment, otherwise, it's an exercise in futility.

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Yahoo should have teamed up with a media provider such as Sony and had GaGa and some of the under 30's "icons" from sports do promo spots..even a F1 driver or two and maybe a "movie star" or two for the "older" wallets..

Buy into "endorsements" and "placements" in movies Tv and in console and pc games..got conspicuously involved with some eco "cause" ..all kinds of stuff..

Which is also how MS should have promoted Bing..and didn't..

Makes one wonder where the ideas "went" from marketing..oh ..yeah..all the thinking was used up working out how to give the people at the top their bonuses..

And they should have rolled out an equivalent to adsense for small sites ( and cleaned up their "partners" ) years ago ..Google's adsense got them free apostles..

Yahoo! and Richard Branson :).

I agree Yahoo's still got a brand. Anyone not able to hear that word in their head...YahOOOOOOOO! ?

By comparison, what's Google sound like?

What is the asking price and what is the current profit?

Taking Yahoo private could provide a massive ROI. EPS was .23 in Q3. They made $293m profit in that quarter which was down 26%. This is a firm with cash on hand still making a profit. This is not a distressed asset. They don't need to be way more cool because they own a huge chunk of the web. Stack a few good decisions on top of each other and bingo. $$$$$$$$

They are worth ~$14 billion. My little ol MBA and Finance degree says that for the right buyer this deal is golden. Google, no way. Microsoft - okay - but very sad. Apple, Cisco, IBM, Adobe, and a few private equity groups could all make it work. I bet even an old dog like Warren Buffett could turn it around without replacing much of the leadership.

The company just needs a visionary leader with free reign and no pressure from the street. Going public is sometimes a mistake.

I agree Yahoo's still got a brand. Anyone not able to hear that word in their head...YahOOOOOOOO! ? By comparison, what's Google sound like?

You certainly make a powerful point, though I'm not quite convinced that merchant banks still measure brand strength on audiometers ;)

A person or group with really serious money and a flare for risk should buy a controlling interest in Yahoo AND AOL (could probably get them at a bargain), integrate the two, bring in a Steve Jobs level visionary (if there are any left), hire the very best cutting-edge managers, designers & programmers, eliminate redundancy and deadwood, hire the most innovative PR firm, and do a full frontal assault on Google. Get in their face every day. Make it a war ~ the press would love it, like Apple & MS in the old days. Things would get very interesting very fast. It won't happen, but oh man, would I love to see it....

I second that.