It’s a good news/try not to choke Jerry Yang situation for anyone eager to see the Microsoft-Yahoo mess resolved; a firm-looking date has been set for Yahoo’s shareholder meeting, yet it’s on the slightly faraway day of August 1st.
Less than a month ago, the company claimed it would gather stockholders on July 3rd, and onlookers nodded at the thought of some forward movement. But that promise got sort of pushed aside as Carl Icahn started his attack.
Carl Icahn
Now, assuming some other surprising development doesn’t take place, August 1st should become an important day. Eric Auchard and Michele Gershberg confirm, “Yahoo . . . said in a regulatory filing that it had rescheduled its annual meeting for August 1 from its original date of July 3. The event will take place at The Fairmont hotel in downtown San Jose, which features a 1,000-person ballroom.”
In terms of shareholders’ tempers, public perception, and actual travel arrangements, another delay would be hugely expensive for Yahoo, so this is likely to stick.
As for what’ll happen at the meeting, Yahoo knows what it wants. In the regulatory filing, bold, capitalized letters state, “OUR BOARD OF DIRECTORS UNANIMOUSLY RECOMMENDS A VOTE FOR THE ELECTION OF ALL OF THE BOARD’S NOMINEES ON THE ENCLOSED WHITE PROXY CARD AND URGES YOU NOT TO SIGN OR RETURN ANY PROXY CARD SENT TO YOU BY THE ICAHN ENTITIES.”
