Word: greenmail
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Journalese is rich in mystic nouns: gentrification, quichification, greenmail, dealignment, watershed elections and apron strings (the political coattails of a female candidate). But students of the language agree that adjectives do most of the work, smuggling in actual information under the guise of normal journalism. Thus the use of soft-spoken (mousy), loyal (dumb), high-minded (inept), hardworking (plodding), self-made (crooked) and pragmatic (totally immoral). A person who is dangerous as well as immoral can be described as a fierce competitor or gut fighter, and a meddler who cannot leave his subordinates alone is a hands-on executive. When...
...Greenmailer. One of Icahn's partners in the Phillips struggle is Saul Steinberg, 45, an expert in the fine art of greenmail. In that corporate maneuver, an investor buys up a large block of stock in a company and threatens to take it over in hopes that the firm's management will become frightened and buy the shares back at a higher price than the stockholders can get, just to get rid of the raider. Last summer, in such a ploy, Steinberg bought 11.1% of Walt Disney Productions. After a long battle with Disney management, he sold the stock...
Pickens' spectacular gains have led critics to charge that he is really an adept practitioner of "greenmail." A greenmailer creates the threat of a takeover by buying a big chunk of a company's stock. He then sells the shares back to the firm at a premium when its executives, fearing the loss of their jobs in a takeover, agree to buy him out. Pickens denies any intention of greenmail: "If we had wanted to greenmail Phillips, it would have been a substantially different deal. Instead, we did stay in and we did work hard for the stockholders...
Some Wall Streeters accused Pickens of "greenmail," the business world's version of blackmail. In a greenmail deal, an investor buys a large enough chunk of a company's stock to pose a takeover threat in the hope that its management will buy the shares at a premium. Pickens denies being a greenmailer, saying that he made a sincere bid to take over Phillips and that all company shareholders will benefit from his actions because the value of their stock will rise. The most venerable greenmail victim of 1984 was Mickey Mouse. Saul Steinberg, a New York City financier, bought...
Your reference to me as a "sometime greenmailer" [ECONOMY & BUSINESS, June 25] is inaccurate. During the Gulf Investors Group's bid for Gulf, we were offered $70 a share on all our stock. The market price then was $54. We flatly declined the greenmail because the same offer was not made to all Gulf shareholders. In fact, I support any legislation that prohibits greenmail...