Further to my post last night – Yahoo disappoints but rises on Alibaba stake– Yahoo’s shares surged by 10.5% today. Not on Yahoo’s dismal results but as a way for investors to get a stake in what could well turn out to be the biggest tech IPO in a long while. Analysts are valuing Alibaba as high as $120b. Yahoo has a 24% stake and is valued at ‘just’ $32b at close tonight. Given Yahoo’s $4.8b cash, on my reckoning that values Yahoo’s core business at…zilch!
By the way, as I reported Yahoo is having difficulty scaling its mobile ads business. Today Yahoo has bought AdMovate. It’s a mobile ad startup and one suspects Yahoo were more interested in the talent rather than the product.