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Warren Buffett and Dan Gilbert Unite in Bid to Acquire Yahoo

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Re: Warren Buffett and Dan Gilbert Unite in Bid to Acquire Yahoo

#71

Post by ep103 »

Someone1234 wrote: post #5
TrainedMonkey wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Valuations dropped enough for it to be a sensible buy. Buffet stated before that he does not understand why tech valuations are so high based on the fundamentals.

And he's quite right. Apple might be the exception because of their extensive cash reserves. But if you look at Facebook or Twitter, it is hard to tell why they're selling for that amount. I myself avoid index funds which over-invest in tech because I believe we're in a bubble.

eh, the valuation on facebook I understand though. Yes, it is extremely high, but the premise is that with that much social data, that much user stickiness, and that level of talent, and you are one of very few players that look like they could seriously give google a run for their money in the advertising business. Read enough, and you start wondering if Verizon / Google / Facebook won't outright own digital advertising industry in enough time. Read some more fanciful stuff, and you start wondering if they have enough data to actually change user behavior and dictate spending streams preemptively.

I could be wrong on all of this though, I'm just a dev, not an industry expert : )

Re: Warren Buffett and Dan Gilbert Unite in Bid to Acquire Yahoo

#72

Post by MicroBerto »

tgb29 wrote: post #70

When I consider Yahoo's value, I think of email, fantasy football, news, and tumblr. All four seem to be struggling when compared to their alternatives, but each of the products appear to have great potential value. It's hard to determine the quality of Mayer's work as CEO; some decisions were good, some look bad. I'm not confident she is a product person, and this is based on her management of Tumblr and the lack of…

Were I to take on Yahoo, I'd turn it into a content powerhouse, with supporting tools. Yahoo! Finance should have the best articles -- very technical yet explanatory -- all supported by their stock tools. A billion ways to monetize that.

I would use Yahoo! Sports to seriously go after ESPN, which is turning into a turdpile of garbage that's worse than TMZ. I'd literally troll them and get some extremely technical content as well as the fun stuff. Monetize with fantasy, tickets, live stream, schwag, etc.

Rinse and repeat with other news sectors. I'd find about a dozen niches and build out some aggregators with trending stuff - basically DrudgeReport style aggregators for each niche - awesome headlines and all.

Eventually, steer some content towards consumer facing products, and build out a shopping engine for the ones that are consumer-related.

Would this be the next Facebook or Google? No. But it'd be profitable as hell and with the right no-holds-barred content team in each niche, it'd once again become intertwined with American culture. It would "never" die, and it'd be a true fighter for the first amendment.

I don't deal with apps so I'd hire one of you guys to be my #2 for that side of the game.

Buffett and Gilbert you know who to call when you want this company to become relevant again.

Re: Warren Buffett and Dan Gilbert Unite in Bid to Acquire Yahoo

#73

Post by randomThoughts9 »

maxsilver wrote: post #48
samstave wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But who cares about yahoo? (Serious question) yahoo should just die. Please tell me why it shouldn't

A lot of non-technical older users still use Yahoo properties. My mom still uses Yahoo Mail, and Yahoo.com is her homepage (by choice). I don't know how to quantify what that's worth, but I can't imagine it's nothing .

At least in Eastern Europe, most developers in the 90's used yahoo (mail + messenger) and a lot of them still do, even though not exclusively anymore.

Re: Warren Buffett and Dan Gilbert Unite in Bid to Acquire Yahoo

#74

Post by encoderer »

Someone1234 wrote: post #57
encoderer wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How you could compare Facebook to Twitter is beyond me.

I didn't compare them, I grouped them together.

So you would group them, but not compare them to each other?

Re: Warren Buffett and Dan Gilbert Unite in Bid to Acquire Yahoo

#77

Post by adventured »

MicroBerto wrote: post #72
tgb29 wrote: post #70

When I consider Yahoo's value, I think of email, fantasy football, news, and tumblr. All four seem to be struggling when compared to their alternatives, but each of the products appear to have great potential value. It's hard to determine the quality of Mayer's work as CEO; some decisions were good, some look bad. I'm not confident she is a product person, and this is based on her management of Tumblr and the lack of…

Were I to take on Yahoo, I'd turn it into a content powerhouse, with supporting tools. Yahoo! Finance should have the best articles -- very technical yet explanatory -- all supported by their stock tools. A billion ways to monetize that. I would use Yahoo! Sports to seriously go after ESPN, which is turning into a turdpile of garbage that's worse than TMZ. I'd literally troll them and get some extremely technical con…

It would cost billions of dollars to even attempt to go after ESPN. The primary value ESPN offers today is ownership of broadcast rights. Yahoo can't afford to outbid Disney on those rights and shareholders would never support risking that much capital on such.

What you're describing would never make money. Aggregator sites are among the worst things you could ever attempt if your goal is to make money, which is why so many of them fail and or produce mediocre business outcomes.

Drudge is a unique outcome that is nearly impossible to repeat - which is why nobody has been able to replicate it after all of these years. Its popularity occurred solely due to the Clinton impeachment scandal and two decades of brand / trust building when it comes to editing.

Having a juggernaut of articles and content in business / finance is worth very little. You could combine TheStreet.com, Marketwatch.com, Quartz, Seeking Alpha, Fool.com and Business Insider all under one umbrella and it would be worth less than a billion dollars and barely make any money. It would be a complete waste of time and wouldn't move the needle on Yahoo's business.

Re: Warren Buffett and Dan Gilbert Unite in Bid to Acquire Yahoo

#78

Post by taylorwc »

tosseraccount wrote: post #49
bmuon wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Big misconception: Yahoo is profitable, it's just not growing.

Check. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/apr/19/yahoo-qua... Yahoo announced falling revenues and a quarterly loss of $99.2m on Tuesday - from April 19, 2016

You zoomed in on a quarter, which is not a good way to look at it. From an annual standpoint, they have been profitable for each of the last 4 years, excluding 2015. 2015 Included a massive impairment of goodwill (which is not a cash expense) at $4.4B[0] and would have otherwise been profitable.

[0] http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1011006/0001193125164...

Re: Warren Buffett and Dan Gilbert Unite in Bid to Acquire Yahoo

#79

Post by JumpCrisscross »

ori_b wrote: post #14
hristov wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably valuations dropped low enough that yahoo can be valued as a classic media company instead of a tech company. What generally scares Buffet from tech is that the price of tech stocks is greatly inflated to reflect expectations of future growth. Buffet is very skeptical of inflated expectations of future growth. But I do not think there is any great expectations of future growth in yahoo. In fact many analysts…

> In fact many analysts say that if you strip out the valuable asian assets, the value implied by the market for Yahoo's US business is about zero or even negative. If the value implied by the stock price is zero or negative, then even buying the company and selling off the office furniture nets you a tidy profit. More realistically, it's very likely that if a company has negative value -- ie, that someone would pay…

> if a company has negative value...then it is severely undervalued

Or severely fucked. Every company on the verge of bankruptcy skirts with negative equity value.

As for enterprise value, there are oil E&P companies trading below zero today. One must consider the costs of diligence, maintaining the asset until oil goes up and environmental clean-up. The economic value of some companies is questionable.

On Yahoo!, there is a difference between minority-stake investing and buying companies. Some managers are terrible. A hundred million dollars put in a box, put in a corporation, and handed to them is worth zero if they can't be replaced before the cash has been burnt.

Re: Warren Buffett and Dan Gilbert Unite in Bid to Acquire Yahoo

#80

Post by make3 »

howlingfantods wrote: post #31

Buffett is no fool. Berkshire is providing the financing to Dan Gilbert's group and will receive guaranteed interest as well as an option to convert to equity. I'm sure that financing is jammed packed with warrants and covenants. Buffett has basically parlayed the prestige of his name into sweetheart deals with provisions that no other company could get (eg. his investment in Goldman Sachs).

isn't yahoo google's failed retarded little brother? I don't see them becoming anything, anytime soon. The only point of this acquisition would be to pivot the whole thing hard or to dismantle it and spread its resources to other assets
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