Eric Jackson, the sassy activist investor who made so much trouble for Yahoo this year, has given up the ghost, crapped out, sailed into the sunset — pick your truism, Jackson has probably used it! He gave hunky videoblogger John Paczkowski a block-that-metaphor-worthy explanation for why he sold his hedge fund's Yahoo stake at $20:
Major Yahoo shareholders still want blood from CEO Jerry Yang, chairman Roy Bostock and director Ron Burkle, whom they hold responsible for botching negotiations with Microsoft. BoomTown's Kara Swisher predicts that at least one large fund manager will refuse to vote for their reelection to Yahoo's board during the company's annual meeting, August 1. Activist investor and president of Ironfire Capital Eric Jackson wants to take it further.
$30 billion hedge fund Paulson & Co. has released filings to show it owns 3.4 percent of Yahoo shares and intends to support Carl Icahn's bid to replace the company's board. Combined with Icahn's 4.3 percent share, Legg Mason fund manager Bill Miller's 5 percent share and Capital Research fund manager Gordon Crawford's 6 percent share, at least 18 percent of Yahoo's ownership now favors displacing the company's board with directors more amenable to a Microsoft merger. Capital Research funds beyond Crawford's control own another 11 percent of the company, raising that total to at least 29 percent. Shareholder activist Eric Jackson says investors owning another 3.2 million Yahoo shares favor a Microsoft merger as well. CEO Jerry Yang and chairman Roy Bostock can write all the letters they want. There's only one holdup: Getting Microsoft back to the table. (Photo by Simon Grossi)
Yahoo will hold its annual shareholders' meeting on July 3. Investors angry over how Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang the Yahoo board handled merger negotiations with Microsoft — paging Gordon Crawford and Bill Miller — have until next Thursday to do so by submitting an alternate slate of directors to replace the current board. Wall Street analysts don't expect it to happen, reports the Financial Times. Activist shareholder Eric Jackson, the president of Ironfire Capital, isn't listening to them, however.
Rumors that Ed Zander may step down as CEO of Motorola caused the stock to rise nearly 2% today. Whether or not the rumor is true, it demonstrates investors are no longer confident in Ed Zander's leadership of the chip and cell phone manufacturer. It also shows the growing power of the grassroots shareholder campaigns of Eric Jackson, who recently took on Terry Semel at Yahoo.
