Stock question is dogging Microsoft
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Microsoft Corp. shareholders yesterday overwhelmingly approved a plan that clears the way for the company to issue them a huge, one-time dividend -- the biggest piece of a $75 billion cash payout that many shareholders have long advocated.
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By Troy Wolverton, San Jose Mercury News, Calif.  Dec. 17--If you ask investors how they're evaluating Apple Computer's stock, they'll give you any number of answers.   Some are focused on Apple's recent share gains in the PC market and foresee more to come.
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But why do investors like this stock?
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Thumbs up: Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people ) on Tuesday said investors paved the way for a one-time-only $3 dividend. Shareholders in the software colossus OK&#39;d amendments to the company&#39;s stock plans
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(240 sec.) Why this is a blip for stocks and where to invest now.
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Google has received the green light for its initial stock offering -- but not without ruffling a few feathers at the Securities &amp; Exchange Commission, which oversees share offerings. The SEC&#39;s job is to make sure that companies disclose all the ...
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FOR Microsoft shareholders, Christmas may come early this year in the form of a one-off $US2.35 ($3) dividend that&#39;s part of the company&#39;s plan to return some of its $US50.
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Investors eye $8bn takeover claim Microsoft wants to buy mouse maker Logitech, if investor speculation is to be believed.â¦
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This stock is still on fire, and it's not confounding this skeptic.
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Microsoft may end up having to raise the amount it is willing to pay for Yahoo if the software company&#39;s stock continues to drop while Yahoo&#39;s continues to rise.In the week since&#160;Microsoft made its surprise bid for Yahoo, the price Microsoft is willing to offer the Internet company has dropped by nearly 7 percent as Microsoft&#39;s share price has fallen. In the meantime, Yahoo&#39;s shares have risen in value, trading at nearly the $31 per share Microsoft was willing to pay, making the company potentially worth a higher asking price and the offer vulnerable to higher bids.Microsoft announced its offer to acquire Yahoo on Feb. 1, saying it would pay $31 for half of Yahoo&#39;s outstanding shares and 0.9509 of a Microsoft share for the other half. Microsoft&#39;s half-cash/half-stock offer to Yahoo was valued at about $44.6 billion at the time it was made.The stock half was based on the $32.60 Microsoft share price at the end of Thursday, the day before the deal was announced last Friday. Yahoo&#39;s share price at the close of market on Jan. 31 was $19.18. The cash half of the deal was $22.3 billion, which, when considering Microsoft agreed to pay $31 per share, is based on half of Yahoo&#39;s outstanding shares being 719,354,838.Microsoft has not publicly said what number of outstanding shares it has based its offer price on. In its form 10-Q filed Nov. 9, 2007, Yahoo&#39;s outstanding shares as of Oct. 31, 2007, were 1,336,444,034. However, cutting that number in half and multiplying it by Microsoft&#39;s $31 per-share offer adds up to $20.7 billion, not the $22.3 billion in cash Microsoft is offering.By Friday afternoon, Microsoft&#39;s share price was down about 12 percent at $28.40. Based on that price and assuming that 719,354,838 is the other half of Yahoo&#39;s outstanding shares -- and then factoring in the $22.3 billion cash offer -- the amount of the bid stands at $41.7 billion.Microsoft&#39;s stock is likely down due to its offer for a number of reasons, said a financial analyst who was interviewed Friday and asked not to be named. Investors may not be happy with the money Microsoft is willing to pay for Yahoo, and&#160;strategic questions surrounding how the companies will pull off a merger&#160;successfully also are driving the stock down.Moreover, the deal is expected to dilute Microsoft&#39;s earnings in fiscal 2009 and perhaps even in fiscal 2010, so the company&#39;s earnings predictions likely will come down, the analyst said.On the other hand, Yahoo&#39;s stock has been buoyed by speculation there could be other, higher bidders for the company now that Microsoft has shown its hand. Yahoo stock has risen nearly 34 percent since the deal was announced; on Friday afternoon it was trading at nearly $29, which is only slightly lower than the current per-share for the stock half of Microsoft&#39;s offer.Microsoft has declined to comment about whether it will adjust its offer so that the final amount of the deal will be the original $44.6 billion offered. The cash half for the time being remains the same, sources close to the company said Friday. However, this could change in last-minute dealings if Microsoft&#39;s stock continues to lose value while Yahoo&#39;s rises, and other companies offer competitive bids for Yahoo in the meantime.
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The software company gets a stock boost from sacking its chief exec. Also: Microsoft continues to battle European courts. & hellip; University of Texas and Sun Microsystems come together to make a computer & hellip;. and more.
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Microsoft may end up having to raise the amount it is willing to pay for Yahoo if the software company's stock continues to drop while Yahoo's continues to rise.
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Sorry, technophiles. This stock still ain't cheap enough.
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Bargain hunters may want to keep an eye on this stock.
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Stocks to watch on Friday: MICROSOFT  CORP. MSFT.O: The world's largest software maker will suffer  serious harm if it is forced to provide a version of Windows  without Windows Media Player audio-visual software, its lawyer  told a European Union court.
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Transact's stock is on a tear. Is it time to cash in the ticket?
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(InfoWorld) - Bill Gates sold over 20 million shares of Microsoft Corp. stock last month, with just around 2 million of the shares affected by global stock market turmoil. The company chairman sold nearly 4 million shares of Microsoft stock in the last three days of February, including 1.87 million shares last Monday, 990,000 shares on Tuesday, and 1 million shares on Wednesday, according to filings to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The Tuesday share sale coincided with one of the worst days global stock markets have seen in years. The Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged 416 points on the day to end at 12,216. Microsoft dropped 4.1 percent on the day to end at US$27.87. The company is part of the Dow index. Market watchers blame the global equities turmoil on everything from a sell-off in Shanghai shares to fears of an end to the carry-trade, a term referring to Japan. For years, investors have been able to borrow money in Japan for nearly free because the nation has maintained near-zero interest rates. Borrowers have then taken that money and invested it elsewhere, including in global stock and precious metals markets. The fear is that Japan may start hiking interest rates, causing investors to sell assets bought using their borrowed yen to repay their obligations. Japan has maintained low interest rates for years, a measure aimed at bolstering its economy. No one has blamed the technology sector for the sell-off, but share sales by major figures do attract attention from people trying to gauge the direction markets might take. Gates is considered an insider due to his position at Microsoft, and therefore has to file notices to the SEC when he sells shares, leaving a public record of transactions. He collected over half a billion dollars from the February share sale, according to the SEC filings. The filings do not say why Gates sold the shares. After the share sale, however, he remains the largest shareholder in Microsoft with 917.5 million shares, or around 9.2 percent of shares outstanding.