from the won't-someone-think-of-the-shareholders dept.
regift_of_the_gods writes:
"Corporate raider Carl Icahn has turned his attention to eBay, announcing a proxy fight for board seats via open letters to shareholders. Icahn thinks the company should spin off its PayPal division and distribute the proceeds to the shareholders. The current board thinks differently, but Icahn says that's partly because of massive conflicts of interest held by board members (Netscape founder, now venture capitalist) Marc Andreessen and (Intuit CEO) Scott Cook. For Exhibit A and B, Icahn mentions the large profits Andressen Horowitz made from eBay's earlier spinoff of Skype, and its subsequent sale to Microsoft; and the fact that Intuit and PayPal are competitors in the payment processing space.
Andreessen has been posting responses on his blog. The latest references Icahn's three year proxy campaign for control of pharmaceutical company Forest Labs, that ended several weeks ago with Forest's sale to a company called Actavis. Forest's directors cried foul in 2011 over one of Icahn's nominees to the board, claiming Eric Ende had an unusual compensation clause allowing him to share directly in Icahn's profits on the Forest deal achieved within 30 months, i.e. in the short term."
(Score: 2) by GungnirSniper on Thursday March 06 2014, @07:38AM
Aren't PayPal and eBay perfect together since the duo effectively get to double-dip on PalPay transactions done on eBay?
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(Score: 2) by nitehawk214 on Thursday March 06 2014, @03:23PM
Not to mention creating a captive userbase for PayPal.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 2, Interesting) by captaindeerface on Thursday March 06 2014, @08:13AM
Carl Icahn is just doing what Carl Icahn does, try to get control and leverage for personal gain.
Im guessing that is because he's getting near the end of life (78) and wants control of something or some kind of greater purpose in life. For him in his world, that is being a leader of the "share holder activists" with the "Ichan Report".
From the outside, he's just an old extremely rich douche that only cares about the numbers. His numbers. Like when he gutted TWA for his own personal gain. He got control, stripped and sold asserts and paid himself off first for several hundred million.
He'll keep doing this stuff until he dies. I hope he can become a better human before then and leave this world better than he found it (i hope we all try!). Preston curve says he only has a hand full of years left wealth only adds so much time.
wow, somber.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by TheGratefulNet on Thursday March 06 2014, @08:43AM
you've just described (the mentality, at least) of every Very Rich person in america.
they never do things for the common good. very very rarely, and usually only by accident.
they are the most selfish fucks out there and they hoard they riches. they don't enrich society, they DRAIN society.
I'm not at all surprised. but then again, the rich are 'not like you and I'. (sigh).
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
(Score: 1) by davester666 on Thursday March 06 2014, @09:17AM
You mean the trickle-down economy that the Republican's keep pushing at us as the reason for lowering taxes on the very wealthy is just a scam so they don't have to pay taxes?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 06 2014, @03:46PM
> you've just described (the mentality, at least) of every Very Rich person in america.
Yeah, what other stereotypes do you believe in? All poor people are lazy? All poor people are "the salt of the earth"? All poor people are dumb? All poor people like NASCAR?
Do you seriously believe that the rich are any different than the rest of us?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by GungnirSniper on Thursday March 06 2014, @05:55PM
Don't lump the producers of imaginary value, banksters like Icahn and Madoff, in with those who created great things like Gates, [wikipedia.org] Ellison, [wikipedia.org] and countless other successful people who donate to causes near to them. There will always be people who love nothing more than money, but fortunately most people, even most wealthy people, are not like that.
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(Score: 2) by nitehawk214 on Thursday March 06 2014, @03:27PM
I do not see Carl Icahn becoming like Warren Buffet. This guy just wants to die on top the biggest pile of money, he will destroy companies and people to get it.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 1) by TheGratefulNet on Thursday March 06 2014, @06:43PM
This guy just wants to die on top the biggest pile of money
like in the batman movie (dark knight)?
I'd buy a ticket to such an event. how long *does* it take for the rich to burn?
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 06 2014, @08:16AM
Sometimes it leaks into ebay a little. And they move it back over to paypal. And ohhh... we just froze your account. teehee. sucks to be you.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by carguy on Thursday March 06 2014, @01:36PM
> ...we just froze your account. teehee. sucks to be you.
I keep reading about frozen accounts, but my PayPal account works fine. I leave a small balance with PayPal since paying people from a balance can be done with zero transaction cost (read the fine print). Anyone who sells things (on eBay or elsewhere) and lets the balance accumulate in PayPal may be asking for trouble.
There is an easy work-around, just transfer money to a linked bank account and take it out of PayPal's control, this is easy to set up in USA (I don't know about other countries). As an extra level of separation, we set up a separate bank account to link with PayPal -- and this account only has a small balance (maintained by transfers back and forth to our main bank account.)
(Score: 2, Insightful) by bootsy on Thursday March 06 2014, @10:05AM
If they did split Paypal would it then make sense to regulate it as Bank under the various financial laws of the countries it operates in? As it stands right now it acts like a money broker but doesn't have to comply with any of the rules or give any of the consumer protection.
It's also a huge monopoly which probably needs looking into.