EA Extends T2 Share Purchase Deadline, Drops Share Price

EA Extends T2 Share Purchase Deadline, Drops Share Price

April 18, 2008
Electronic Arts announced this morning that it is extending its tender offer for outstanding shares of Take Two stock until May 16th. The original offer was set to expire at midnight tonight.

As expected, EA also reduced its offer price from $26 per share to $25.74 to reflect the economic impact of the huge compensation package awarded to Strauss Zelnick and his team at last evening's Take Two shareholders meeting. From EA's press release:
EA continues to believe that the offer price is full and fair, and that a transaction between Take-Two and EA is the most compelling combination financially, strategically and operationally for all parties.

As of 5:00 p.m., EDT, on April 17, 2008, 6,432,787 shares of Take-Two had been tendered in and not withdrawn from the tender offer.

UPDATE: Bloomberg has more on the EA-T2 situation, including a recap of last night's meeting. Next Generation has news of an angry T2 shareholder who is suing the company over its rejection of the EA bid.

And from Reuters comes word that U.S. District Court Judge Shirley Wohl Kram has ruled that, in yet another shareholder suit, plaintiffs failed to show a linkage between the 2005 Hot Coffee scandal and a subsequent, precipitous drop in the price of T2 shares.

UPDATE 2: Take Two has issued a response to EA's new price & deadline:
The minuscule number of shares tendered [to EA, 8.3% of total outstanding shares], as well as the strong vote in favor of the proposals presented at our annual meeting, offer indisputable evidence that our stockholders regard our efforts to enhance Take-Two’s stockholder value as superior to the EA offer.

...Take-Two’s Board of Directors has maintained from the beginning, and continues to believe, that EA’s proposal undervalues our Company.  It undervalued the company at $26 per share, and it certainly undervalues Take-Two at $25.74.

Comments

@ Papa Midnight

Well... i DON'T follow GTA news, because i don't really follow GTA. I just haven't seen nearly as much hype for it outside of the regular fanbase.
@ Everybody

My initial point was talking about Keith calling GTA4 the 'biggest release' with emphasis on RELEASE. Not necessarily biggest overall sales over any span of time. Just the RELEASE. Which, comparatively, you have to admit, there was a pretty big difference in some ways. *points to Game Fuel*

Jeez, i didn't mean to make some huge argument here. I don't even like the Halo series any more than most other FPS games, i just misunderstood his comment.

@ Ragnaar

Perhaps this Mr. Maulano is the so-called client that JT claimed to have after he was denied entry to the conference?
IT'S A TRAP!
So they're offering LESS money to the company 1 week from releasing pretty much the biggest gaming release of all time.

They're just a bunch of absolute retards over at EA.

Note to EA: Unless you're going to drop $50 a share, you can fuck right off, because those shareholders a sitting on a Gold Mine you want to undercut from right under them. You are dirty-handed sheisters and I hope your company melts away from below your feet.
[...] wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptElectronic Arts announced this morning that it is extending its tender offer for outstanding shares of Take Two stock until May 16th. The original offer was set to expire at midnight tonight. As expected, EA also reduced its offer price from $26 per share to $25.74 to reflect the economic impact of the huge compensation package awarded to Strauss Zelnick and his team at last evening’s Take Two shareholders meeting. From EA’s press release: EA continues to believe that the offer price is full and fair, and that a transaction between Take-Two and EA is the most compelling combination financially, strategically and operationally for all parties. [...]
@Keith K

They aren't offering less money overall, just less per share. T2 created a bunch of shares in their meeting as the full article from Bloomberg says. EA is still offering $2 bill, total, which is now $25.74 per share, rather than $26.

Now the question on everyone's mind: Where's JT?
EA continues to believe that a single game company is good for gaming.

hint: it isn't.
Because offering less money always worked in the past...
This is the last thing we need. EA should bug off. I would be happy, actually if EA closed down. I am tired of them undermining the free spirit of gaming and making mediocre games.
@ Keith K

'Biggest game release of all time'?

I know this is slightly off-topic, but... come on, highly-anticipated, yes, but biggest release of all time? No, Halo 3 takes that by a long shot. (Hell, SSBB probably had somewhat more hype than this game, i think)

Still, it is greedy of them.
So they are offering $25.75 when the CURRENT share price is $25.85

Yeah... I'm sure the share holders will vote for that one...
@Belgarion89: He's kinda busy with his trial trying to get it forestalled. Aside from that, to be honest, I don't really care.

@DavCube: Follow the news. Most analyst and industry "experts" predict that GTAIV's release will blow Halo 3's out the water. Most are predicting that Grand Theft Auto IV will bring in $400 million in sales in it's first week as compared to Halo 3's $300 million. Considering the amount of perfect scores that's been stacking up, that's starting to look pretty feasible. I haven't even mentioned the dual platform simultaneous release.
Next Generation has news of an angry T2 shareholder who is suing the company over its rejection of the EA bid.

Jack Thompson?

*checks*

ZOMG! IT ISN'T!
The story about the shareholder suing T2 is just ridiculous, too. As a shareholder, you have the power to TRY to make the board of the company change their minds. If not, you can do what was done to the previous CEO and boot him and the rest of the board out of there.

OR, you can vote on EA's side when the hostile takeover attempt begins.

OR, you can sell your stock if you're displeased with how the company is running.

It's just like politicians...if you have a bad one, you vote him out the next chance you get.
From the previews I've seen GTA will be awesome. What was it, like 16 new multiplayer modes? Even an MMO type mode? If I had a large share of T2 stock, i'd be more than willing to see where that takes me. Rather than risk my money on people being dumb enough to continually buy EA's tired and bland games.

EA has wrecked every franchise they've aquired. They shouldn't be so quick to count sports games as money in the bank either. I've bought exclusively T2 for years now. With them gone, and prices jacked back up, I will simply go without rather than buy EA garbage. I've got Halo 3, I'm plenty happy to keep playing that.
The really interesting thing here is EA extending it's offer to a deadline in May. Shows that they really want Take Two, and gives creditence to the idea that want they want is a sports franchise monopoly. So much for set in stone deadlines. If they're willing to wait until after GTA IV's release now, why was that such a big problem before?

I'd say unless EA drastically raises it's offer, the take over bid is going to fail. Just too many shareholders that recognize that the company is worth more than EA's offering.
I don't think GTA IV will be more than Halo 3...many of my friends parents would buy Halo 3 but won't buy GTA simply because of the name. I'll rent it, sure, but not buy it
@DavCube & chadachada:

You guys are talking like Halo3 is the biggest selling game of all time... I'm sure it isn't. It just sold more in a short space of time than any other.

Also, Halo 3 is Xbox 360 only. That limits the entire market you can sell to to about 12 million users.

GTAIV is on both PS3 and Xbox 360 and will be out on PC later in the year too... that totals to well over 100 million potential customers.

"I’ll rent it, sure, but not buy it"
Yeh, and get through less than 1% of the game... what's the point.

I will bet a large sum of money against any of you that GTAIV will outsell Halo 3 by the end of the year by at least 1½ times. Parents do not (or should not) be buying this game for their kids. It is for people like me :) And we number in the millions, I assure you ;)
@chadachada

It's off topic, but I'll bet if you rent it, you buy it. Personally, I say go the route of the retail price, rather than the retail price + the rental price.

This will be the best selling game so far this generation. And for those who keep bringing up Halo 3, please be reminded that CoD4 outsold it in a shorter amount of time. I'll bet that GTAIV will go one better.
Hmmm... I wonder... everytime Mr. Maulano speaks, does Jack Thompson's lips move?

Halo 3 may be pretty big, but I think The Sims has beat that out as the best selling game of all time.

Okay... he's suing because they didn't want to be taken over... he wanted to be bought out for more than his shares were worth. Such a lawsuit should be thrown out for the simple idea that a company should just have the right to say 'no' to a takeover... and that the right to refuse helps to strengthen laws against monopolies.
EA extending its offer just proves what everyone has been saying. They only want it for the sports franchise and GTA. Think about it. 1st they said they wanted T2, T2 said no, then they did this whole hostel take over thing, that doesn't seem to be working, and now they suddenly are willing to push the date back till May after saying that this is the set in stone date to make a decision.
This is why the gaming community hates EA right now and they may end up putting themselves out of business.

By the way, to everyone saying that Halo 3 is the biggest game of all time...it isn't, and neither is GTA IV. The biggest game of all time is and will most likely always be "Super Mario Bros" for the original Nintendo.
Who cares? EA won't ever get T2.
I say we all go buy a bunch of Take-Two stock and help stop any hostile takeover attempt.
@ DavCube

Game Fuel was mighty tastey :D.


Also I still have a strong dislike for EA killing WestWood. I can't hate them because of Bioware or C&C 3.
EA killed westwood? FUCK THEM I WANT RED ALERT 3!!!!
@ jab

WestWood made RTS what it is today. I want PetroGlyph working on C&C not EA LA >_
Lets look on the bright side. At least grand theft auto 4 wont come under EA. Also it wont be delayed. yay!!!!!!!!!
If the game industry becomes a monopoly, we will not enjoy great gaming.
How I see it is that if EA creates a monopoly on gaming, what'll probably happen would be the same thing that happened before Nintendo came around in the mid 80's, a swarm of high priced-low quality games will flood the market and basically will cause yet another crash of the gaming market. It happened before, they should remember the mistakes of the past and back off of the independent and small companies before they repeat the same mistake.
Man EA is really dumb! If they think the price is to low, then you raise it, not lower it. Ea is also ignoring that is they were to by Take Two they what ever it cost will be, in the long run it would be worth it to them. EA Marketing must have failed math class.
@Jack Thompson is a douchbag

If it did go through already we'd be seeing like a month delay while they change all the funny parody ads to real world ads for pepsi and nike.
The problem with this is that the board of directors have the legal obligation to make sure that their shareholders get the most money possible for their investment. It is obvious that an EA takeover would be beneficial to shareholders. Here's what makes me mad - if the board of directors decides on an option other than "this will make the most money", they are effectively stealing from clients. It makes no matter that EA will ruin their games and lay off all their employees. The law is clear that a company should follow the path of most profits.
Killhour :

The law might be clear on that (i'm no expert so I can't say) , but I believe you're not thinking far enough. If they make a good game, sell to EA and then it goes down the drain, the shareholders will lose a lot of money.

EA has already scrapped a lot of good developpers (Maxis, Westwood and Bullfrog, for exemple). Since they want no competition in the sport games, there is a good chance they'll scrap quite a good portion of Take Two. If I was in the board of directors, I honestly wouldn't think a buyout from EA would be best for the company IN THE LONG RUN. Especially with the talks of anti-monopoly law problems.
I've been following this for a while now, and what I don't understand is why no one seems to consider Bioshock as one of the reasons for the takeover. It would make sense; big game comes out and EA wants it. That is why I don't want this takeover to happen, Bioshock's sequels would likely be ruined
Urgh, if EA got their hands on Bioshock, you'd end up having to actually pay the vending machines... :(
@GoodRobotUs

And the big daddies would have Nike logos on their boots.
@GoodRobotUs & kurisu7885:

And then they'd churn out some stuff packs with cosmetic changes as well as expansion packs for gameplay changes. Who knew the Big Daddies could speak Simlish?

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