Characteristics Of Hostile And Friendly Takeover Targets

Compared to an average Fortune 500 firm, a target of a hostile takeover is smaller, older, has a lower Tobin's Q, invests less of its income, and is growing more slowly. The low Q seems to be an industry-specific rather than a firm-specific effect. In addition, a hostile target is less likely to be run by a member of the founding family, and has lower officer ownership, than the average firm. In contrast, a target of a friendly acquisitions is smaller and younger than an average Fortune 500 firm, and has comparable Tobin's Qs and most other financial characteristics. Friendly targets are more likely to be run by a member of the founding family, and have higher officer ownership, than the average firm. The decision of a CEO with a large stake and/or with a relationship to a founder to retire often precipitates a friendly acquisition. These results suggest that the motive for a takeover often determines its mood. Thus disciplinary takeovers are more often hostile, and synergistic ones are more often friendly.

Compared to an average Fortune 500 firm, a target of a hostile takeover is smaller, older, has a lower Tobin's Q, invests less of its income, and is growing more slowly. The low Q seems to be an industry-specific rather than a firm-specific effect. In addition, a hostile target is less likely to be run by a member of the founding family, and has lower officer ownership, than the average firm. In contrast, a target of a friendly acquisitions is smaller and younger than an average Fortune 500 firm, and has comparable Tobin's Qs and most other financial characteristics. Friendly targets are more likely to be run by a member of the founding family, and have higher officer ownership, than the average firm. The decision of a CEO with a large stake and/or with a relationship to a founder to retire often precipitates a friendly acquisition. These results suggest that the motive for a takeover often determines its mood. Thus disciplinary takeovers are more often hostile, and synergistic ones are more often friendly.

The paper by Morck, Shleifer, and Vishny contributes significantly to our knowledge of the takeover process. The authors conclude that the motive for friendly acquisitions is more likely to be synergistic, whereas in hostile ones it is more likely to be disciplinary. Hostile targets were older, slow growing firms that were investing a smaller fraction of earnings than the average firm in the sample and whose capital was valued by the market at less than half its replacement cost-all of which is consistent with the theory of the agency costs of free cash, which predicts that managers will generally disinvest too slowly. I agree with the authors' conclusions, but there are a number of things the authors did not examine that would have considerably improved our understanding of the issues.The authors did not consider takeover attempts that were unsuccessful, that is, attempts in which the target firm remained independent. Their conclusions apply only to friendly or hostile acquisition targets that were eventually taken over. The authors therefore missed an opportunity to tell us something about firms that were more likely to fail at a friendly deal or more likely to successfully fight off a hostile offer.

Compared to an average Fortune 500 firm, a target of a hostile takeover is smaller, older, has a lower Tobin's Q, invests less of its income, and is growing more slowly. The low Q seems to be an industry-specific rather than a firm-specific effect. In addition, a hostile target is less likely to be run by a member of the founding family, and has lower officer ownership, than the average firm. In contrast, a target of a friendly acquisitions is smaller and younger than an average Fortune 500 firm, and has comparable Tobin's Qs and most other financial characteristics. Friendly targets are more likely to be run by a member of the founding family, and have higher officer ownership, than the average firm. The decision of a CEO with a large stake and/or with a relationship to a founder to retire often precipitates a friendly acquisition. These results suggest that the motive for a takeover often determines its mood. Thus disciplinary takeovers are more often hostile, and synergistic ones are more often friendly.

The takeover boom that began in the mid-1980s has exhibited many phenomena not previously observed, such as hostile takeovers and takeover defenses, a widespread use of cash as a means of payment for targeted firms, and the acquisitions of companies ranking among the largest in the country. With the aim of more fully understanding the implications of such occurances, contributors to this volume consider a broad range of issues as they analyze mergers and acquisitions and study the takeoveer process itself.

Two strengths distinguish this textbook from others. One is its presentation of subjects in the contexts wherein they occur. The other is its use of current events. Other improvements have shortened and simplified chapters, increased the numbers and types of pedagogical supplements, and expanded the international appeal of examples.

We examine performance and management characteristics of Fortune 500 firms experiencing one of three types of control change: internally precipitated management turnover, hostile takeover, and friendly takeover. We find that firms experiencing internally precipitated management turnover perform poorly relative to other firms in their industries, but are not concentrated in poorly performing industries. In contrast, targets of hostile takeovers are concentrated in troubled industries. There is also weaker evidence that hostile takeover targets underperform their industry peers. We interpret this evidence as consistent with the idea that the board of directors is capable of firing managers whose leadership leads to poor performance relative to industry, but that an external challenge in the form of a hostile takeover is often required when the whole industry is in decline. The evidence also indicates that firms run by a member of the founding family are less likely to experience either internally precipitated top management turnover or a hostile takeover. On the other hand, firms whose top management team is dominated by a single, relatively young top executive, while lacking in internal discipline, are more likely to experience a hostile takeover.

Bachelor Thesis from the year 2007 in the subject Business economics - Miscellaneous, grade: 94,0 %, International University of Monaco, 65 entries in the bibliography, language: English, abstract: Objective of this thesis was to identify the trends and developments of country-specific defense strategies against hostile takeovers and their determinants. Thus, it was necessary to analyze which possibilities of corporate defense would actually be feasible in certain countries. Defense strategies were subdivided into preventive and ad-hoc strategies. National characteristics and differentiators were shown and analyzed regarding their suitability as a defense measure. Especially in France and Germany the big influential players have been in a process of change: banks and governments are pursuing different investment strategies and companies loose their "systematic protection". The example of Germany illustrates that companies are looking for protective alternatives as old structures like the Rhenish capitalism are breaking up. The growth of M&A activities, especially of hostile takeovers, has affected national legislation to tighten their regulations; France has lifted barriers regarding takeovers (both friendly and hostile) regarding 11 specific industries at the time being. This example illustrates the increasingly protectionist behavior in Europe on a governmental level. Corporate Governance generally takes shareholders more and more into consideration regarding the vote on the adoption of defense measures and golden parachutes. In the US, companies started to diminish golden parachutes as a result of the proposal of activist shareholders. In many European countries, however, there are still enough loopholes to avoid foregone shareholder voting. A contrary trend is to be seen in the US, where poison pills are diminished on a fast pace. In addition, shareholders vote increasingly in favor of declassified boards. Golden parachutes are still prevalent, but not