Did anyone notice that Take-Two (NASDAQ: TTWO) closed today at $25.14, or sixty cents under EA's current (and apparently endlessly renewable) $25.74 tender offer?
By our count it's at least the second time that TTWO has closed below the tender price in the past week, admittedly a rocky one for Wall Street. It seems kind of strange, since EA will buy all the TTWO you care to sell them at 25.74. Why would anyone sell below that price?
For interpretation, GamePolitics turns to Wedbush-Morgan super-analyst Michael Pachter:
GP: Mike, what do you make of TTWO closing well below the EA tender price of 25.74? That would seem to be a natural floor…
Pachter: The daily [share] price is the probability-weighted price of a [T2-EA] deal happening. [The expectation of] no deal is [priced] around $17-20, a deal at $28 has a relatively high probability. Before, the arbs placed a higher chance of a deal, and a higher [share] price.
GP: So are you saying that today's close $.60 under the [EA] tender price reflects a sense that the deal is now less likely?
Pachter: A combination of less likely or a lower expected deal price. Probably more of the latter, as a tribute to EA's discipline. Still very likely that a deal happens at $27-28.
Comments
Dennis, I defy you watch CNBC for any extended length of time a tell me anything day-to-day investors do makes sense.
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So speak I, some random guy.
Makes perfect sense to me. If no deal happens, which is still a possibility, the price will plummet, so the share price factors in that possibility.
I don't know alot about stocks, but wouldn't EA be securing shares through options rather than outright purchases, at least until they were in a position to gain a controlling share?
patcher is an ignoramius douche. I've never posted on this board before, but i read alot of the stuff here. Patcher claimed less than a month before EA's offer that there was zero chance that EA would make an offer for TTWO. In fact, he only recently upgraded his price recommendation for ttwo from $9 bucks a share to something like $25.
This stock and company have a new found discipline and value. Most analysts get it right 50% of the time. Patcher has repeatedly been dead wrong about the industry, especially when Take Two is involved. Dennis, please interview some of the long term shareholders that float about ttwo's message board on yahoo finance. you'll find better analysis there than with Patcher. Best example right now would be the fact that Patcher claimed initially that maybe 6 million copies of GTA IV would sell for the financial year (ends october).
Currently GTA IV has sold 9 MILLION copies. But apparently those prices were "baked into" EA's offer price, even though patcher missed the mark by millions of copies. I could find more examples, but I can't really be bothered. please stop using this guy as any kind of analyst. His remarks just smack of a "can't admit I was wrong" attitude at best and possibly at worst "I'm a paid mouth piece of shorters or EA and am trying desparately to keep the share price down."
follow up on this...
a little old now, but will give you the idea of my ire....
dennis, maybe you can ask him to confirm some these sounds bites he's provided? :)
http://messages.finance.yahoo.com/Business_%26_Finance/Investments/Stock...
Yep, Patcher's pretty much batting 0.000. Particularly amusing is his instance that he'd already factored in GTAIV sales when he called EA's offer a fair price, despite the fact that he grossly underestimated what those sales would be.
Personally I find his current insistance that "Still very likely that a deal happens at $27-28." to be quite amusing. EA hasn't budged on their offer price for months now. What makes him so sure they'll suddenly up their offering price? Does he really think the next Take Two reinteration of their rejection will finally move EA?
-Gray17
Pachter being out of touch and misinformed has never stopped him getting coverage and thus, undeserved credibility.
I posted here two months ago that I sold my Take Two stock because it was over valued, and I obviously was right, but Dennis MCCauley, that great ecomomist and legal titan, wouldn't publish my post.
Once again, I was right. And it never gets old being right. Does it get old being wrong so much, Dennis?
Jack Thompson
And your point is what exactly?
I sold my stock in National Dairies, but I don't expect the Dairy Industry's magazines to report this. Stock is bought and sold all the time by private indivuduals such as ourselves, Sir. While you may be relevent to many topics I hardly see why your portfolio would be of interest to those here.
Well he made a big deal out of it when he bought it in the name of trying to get investor information/into the shareholder meeting. So it's been of peripheral interest to a couple of stories. Him selling it wouldn't likely be of particular note though, unless enough people bugged Dennis about it.
-Gray17
Let me ask you, Jack. Does it ever get so old being an annoying douche who always thinks he's right when in fact he's wrong 99.9% of the time? Does it get old, Jack? Not to mention that, even if Dennis DID mention that you sold your T2 stock no one on this site would care. Besides, why the hell were you owning T2 stock in the first place? I thought you hated them because they sell their EVILLLLLLLLLLL video games to children?! Which, by the way, you havent been able to prove or provide a single shred of evidence of. Have fun living in fanastyland disbarred, Jack.
If I remember the stories correctly, as stated by the fine individual who replied to my former post, he wished to force them to let him speak at the stock holder meetings. He was going to rally the stock holders against the management and get rid of their controversial projects.
so you admit to selling your stock to make a profit?
岩「…Ace beats Jack」
Um... yes he did. Do you even read your OWN posts here anymore? I thought that's what you LIVED on!
And how much did you get for your amazingly irrelevent deal Jack? A few bucks? Sold a few shares...and how many tens of thousands of shares comprise T2? What you did was not even a drop in the bucket. Add the fact that T2 shares fluctuate a few dollars is no surprise. The Dow lost over 200 points in one day, and ended the week up 70 points. In the last 6 months, Google has gone from over 700 a share to roughly 540 a share. Big deal Jack, see you at the unemployment line.
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