黑石究竟對戴爾了解多少？
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????前幾天晚上，黑石集團（The Blackstone Group）宣布放棄競購戴爾公司（Dell Inc.），給出的一個原因是這家個人電腦制造商的“財務狀況正在迅速受到侵蝕”。特別是，戴爾已經將“當年的運營利潤預期從37億美元下調至30億美元。” ????黑石所說的是3月25日，戴爾在其初步股東委托書中所引用的數據。委托書中提到了戴爾董事會和特別委員會如何對管理層的財務預期失去信心，其中包括“37億美元”這個數據。因此，戴爾公司從外部聘請了波士頓咨詢公司（Boston Consulting Group，BCG），來為它提供財務預測。 ????波士頓咨詢公司在一月中旬向戴爾特別委員會提交的報告認為，戴爾2013年的運營利潤實際上應該設定為34億美元。進行報告陳述時，艾弗考爾合伙人公司（Evercore Partners）也在場。戴爾特別委員會后來聘請這家公司負責“詢價程序”。之后到了二月初，艾弗考爾利用那些數據和其他信息向董事會報告稱，2013年的凈收入實際應該在30億美元左右。 ????于是，情況開始變得撲朔迷離。 ????黑石集團的一位發言人稱，公司在“詢價程序”結束時（3月22日），也就是在提交其投資意向之前，對艾弗考爾30億美元的預測一無所知。這意味著艾弗考爾根本沒有將信息披露給黑石，也意味著這些信息并未提交到黑石集團有權查閱的保密資料庫。似乎黑石已經得知了波士頓咨詢集團關于34億美元的預測報告，但在前兩天晚上寫給特別委員會的信中，黑石并未提到這件事。 ????據知情人士透露，30億美元的預期實際上直到3月31日才被提交至資料庫。而在那時，報告的內容早已通過3月29日的委托書對外公開。筆者曾試圖聯系戴爾特別委員會和艾弗考爾，確認上述事實。 ????如果這個時間表是準確的，那么問題肯定出在戴爾身上。尋求更高的收購價格確實是艾弗考爾和特別委員會的工作，但他們不應通過扣留重大信息這種方式來達成目的。所以，肯定有人犯了錯誤。不論他是代表戴爾，還是黑石集團的利益。 ????還有一點需要注意的是，早在3月15日，美國全國廣播公司財經頻道（CNBC）的戴維?費伯曾報道稱，委托書將對37億美元的預測進行大幅下調。 |
????When The Blackstone Group ended its pursuit of Dell Inc. last night, on of the reasons it cited was the PC maker's "rapidly eroding financial profile." Specifically, that Dell had "revised its operating income projections for the current year to $3.0 billion from $3.7 billion." ????What Blackstone (BX) is talking about is referenced in Dell's (DELL) preliminaryproxy statement, dated March 25. It tells of how Dell's board and special committee had begun to lose faith in management's financial projections, which included the $3.7 billion figure. So it hired an outside party, Boston Consulting Group, to provide an alternate financial forecast. ????It would be BCG's report, submitted to Dell's special committee in mid-January, that would argue Dell's operating income for 2013 should actually be pegged at $3.4 billion. Also present during the presentation was Evercore Partners (EVR), which Dell's special ????committee later hired to run the "go-shop" process. Evercore would later use that data, along with other information, to present a case to the board in early February that 2013 net income actually would be around $3 billion. ????A Blackstone spokesman says that the firm had no knowledge of the $3 billion figure prior to submitting its indication of interest at the end of the "go-shop" process (March 22). That would mean that Evercore never shared such information with Blackstone, and also would mean that the information was not entered into the confidential data room to which Blackstone had access. It does seem that Blackstone had access to the BCG report that put income at $3.4 billion, although Blackstone does not mention that in last night's letter to the special committee. ????This is where things begin to get hazy. ????A source close to the situation says that the $3 billion figure was not actually submitted to the data room until March 31. By that point its contents were already public record, via the March 29 proxy. I have reached out to the special committee and Evercore for confirmation of these facts. ????If this timeline is accurate, then something is really askew in Round Rock. It was Evercore and the special committee's job to seek out higher bids, but not by withholding material information. So someone seems to have dropped the ball here. Either on behalf of Dell, or on behalf of Blackstone. ????Worth also adding that, on March 15, CNBC's David Faber reported that the proxy would show a significant downward revision to that $3.7 billion figure. |
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