ORCL: Is Oracle About to Strike Again?
By William Trent, CFA of Stock Market Beat We generally think Oracle’s (ORCL) acquisition strategy is the right thing for the company and for the industry. Software companies are generally under-leveraged, and even paying for the acquisition in cash would…
This post may contain links from our sponsors and affiliates, and Flywheel Publishing may receive compensation for actions taken through them.
By William Trent, CFA of Stock Market Beat
We generally think Oracle’s (ORCL) acquisition strategy is the right thing for the company and for the industry. Software companies are generally under-leveraged, and even paying for the acquisition in cash would leave the company with very little net debt and combined annual cash flows of nearly $4 billion to offset the current debt of $5.7 billion. So we say they were overdue for another big buyout.
Right on schedule, according to the New York Times, Oracle to buy Hyperion for $3B:
Oracle Corp., the world’s top database software maker, is near an agreement to buy Hyperion Solutions Corp., which makes software that lets companies analyze and track their performance, for about $3 billion, The New York Times said on Wednesday in its online edition.
If the rumors are correct, the buyout price would be around $50 per Hyperion (HYSL) share, about a 25% premium to the closing price. Given that its shares were already up 30% since issuing a strong outlook in January, its shareholders ought to be pretty happy right now.
The author may hold a position in the securities discussed. The author’s current holdings are as follows: Long: Union Pacific (UNP) put options; Air Products (APD) put options; Bookham (BKHM; Ballard Power (BLDP); Syntax Brillian (BRLC); CMGI (CMGI); Genentech (DNA); Ion Media Networks (ION); Three Five Systems (TFS); IShares Japan (EWJ); StreetTracks Gold (GLD); Starbucks (SBUX); U.S. Oil Fund (USO); Plantronics (PLT) call options; Short: Landstar (LSTR) put options; Plantronics (PLT) put options;
http://stockmarketbeat.com/blog1/
Contact [email protected] for any questions or corrections.
Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.
McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.
His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.
A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.
TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.
McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.