Twitter Auction: Disney, Google Said To Fly Away; Stock Dips Sharply
Twitter shares plummeted more than 16% in pre-market trading following reports from Recode that rumored potential suitors Disney and Google will not bid for the social network company.
Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey sits on Disney’s board. But the entertainment giant, which considered going in, has dropped the idea, the tech site says.
Separately, it reported that Google and Apple would not seek to acquire Twitter. The stories cited unnamed sources familiar with the companies.
That would appear to leave the field clear for Salesforce.com, which has acknowledged its potential interest.
“It’s in our interest to look at everything,” CEO Marc Benioff told CNBC yesterday. “We have to go deep on everything. We have to understand what is possible for our shareholders and what isn’t. But in the scheme of things, if you look back at my track record as a CEO, I think you’ll find that while I look at a lot of things, I actually pass on most.”
If there’s a deal to be done, Twitter is eager to wrap it up by October 27, when it announces its Q3 earnings.
Twitter has a market value of $17.4 billion and is said to be looking for about $30 billion.. Were Disney to have gone ahead with that kind of deal, it would have made Twitter at least twice as expensive as its combined deals for Pixar ($6 billion), Marvel ($4 billion), and Lucasfilm ($4 billion).
Analysts are divided, but several consider such a big bet on Twitter to be too risky. Disney CEO Bob Iger declined at a Boston College event yesterday to confirm or deny that he had hired a banker to investigate a possible bid.
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