Читать книгу Applied Mergers and Acquisitions - Robert F. Bruner - Страница 47

The payment of greenmail is routinely condemned by analysts, investors, editorial writers, and public officials. Stock prices usually fall after greenmail is paid. Greenmail payment takes a target company “out of play” (i.e., it removes the immediate threat of takeover). Terminating the takeover process induces frantic selling by arbitrageurs. The market in the firm’s stock is equilibrating away from highly opportunistic clientele back toward long-term investors. Moreover, investors cannot know as much as managers about a firm’s prospects. The problem is essentially one of signaling or investor relations, which, by and large, firms do poorly. Even if management never talks to shareholders, however, and instead waits for intrinsic value eventually to become manifest in operating performance, paying greenmail still makes economic sense if the wealth transfer to the remaining shareholders is positive.