Word: mergers
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Suddenly, in the midst of discussions between Du Pont and Conoco, another competitor appeared. Texaco made an offer for Conoco that was roughly comparable to Du Font's bid. But Bailey preferred to stick with Du Pont. He feared that even the Reagan Administration would balk at a merger between the two huge oil companies: a Texaco-Conoco combination would be larger than any U.S. energy firm except Exxon...
...merger binge has been a bonanza for a special breed of Wall Street investment banker who negotiates the megabuck deals. Acquisition teams at First Boston Corp., which handled Du Font's bid for Conoco, and Morgan Stanley, which advised the oil company, are expected to earn almost $15 million each from the merger...
Wall Street was also shocked because Jefferson had been chief executive of Du Pont for only two months, since the retirement as chairman of the highly respected Irving Shapiro. After the merger announcement, Jefferson admitted that he had been forced "to make a very quick assessment of whether it was worth throwing our hat into the ring." In fact, one of the first steps Jefferson took in assessing the merger was to call Shapiro for advice. Recalls Jefferson: "We thought about it and concluded that in a merger with Conoco we would be stronger than as Du Pont alone...
...Font's surprise foray shows that few companies or industries are immune to merger fever. As a result, the ranking of top U.S. firms has become almost as volatile as Billboard magazine's Hot 100 pop record chart. The strategies behind the mergers are as varied as the deals themselves. American Express, for example, grabbed the Shearson Loeb Rhoades brokerage house on its way to becoming a one-stop financial service center. To enhance its power on grocery shelves, Nabisco merged with Standard Brands...
Moreover, inflation in construction costs has encouraged companies to buy existing factories rather than build them and acquire mines rather than dig their own. Concludes Tomislava Simic, an expert on merger patterns for Chicago...