4 ms·

For a startup-oriented discussion place, it's shocking how little users know about how mergers/acquisitions/takeovers actually occur in the market. Don't they

For a startup-oriented discussion place, it's shocking how little users know about how mergers/acquisitions/takeovers actually occur in the market. Don't they teach this stuff anymore? I had to learn this in college, many years ago. Of course, it was a little less likely for eccentric billionaires to just "shop" in the market like this for ultra-large corporations. Still. We at least knew how the processes worked.

jenaimarre 4y ago
We all have different backgrounds and different interests, you know. Maybe you can share your knowledge, so those of us who are not dealing with mergers/acquisitions/takeovers can learn something?
spiffytech 4y ago
I took a microeconomics course and a macroeconomics course in college. Mergers/acquisitions may have been mentioned briefly, but they weren't a point of study. Microeconomics focused on why individual entities make decisions, and macroeconomics covered stuff like why we have currency, why is inflation useful and how the Fed manages it, etc. In my decade on HN I've seen a lot about funding, IPOs, and acquisitions of private companies, but very little about hostile takeover of public companies. Where are you expecting people to have developed an incidental background knowledge on deploying / overcoming poison pills?
jacquesm 4y ago
You'd be surprised how many people active in the M&A market don't know. For instance, I regularly get glazed over eyes when I ask parties to sign a letter of non-reliance.
_j5l3 4y ago
> I had to learn this in college, many years ago. I majored in Computer Science and Physics. Which of these disciplines would mergers and acquisitions have been in? Should my algorithms class taught us about diluted stock and RSUs vs ISOs? Does my quantum mechanics professor have a unit on hostile takeovers?
- st_goliath 4y ago
  I guess that'd be astrophysics: Two large piles of money circling each other, causing distant ripples on the stock market.
kasey_junk 4y ago
Hostile takeovers were much more common in the past as well.

jenaimarre 4y ago

We all have different backgrounds and different interests, you know. Maybe you can share your knowledge, so those of us who are not dealing with mergers/acquisitions/takeovers can learn something?

spiffytech 4y ago

I took a microeconomics course and a macroeconomics course in college. Mergers/acquisitions may have been mentioned briefly, but they weren't a point of study. Microeconomics focused on why individual entities make decisions, and macroeconomics covered stuff like why we have currency, why is inflation useful and how the Fed manages it, etc. In my decade on HN I've seen a lot about funding, IPOs, and acquisitions of private companies, but very little about hostile takeover of public companies. Where are you expecting people to have developed an incidental background knowledge on deploying / overcoming poison pills?

jacquesm 4y ago

You'd be surprised how many people active in the M&A market don't know. For instance, I regularly get glazed over eyes when I ask parties to sign a letter of non-reliance.

_j5l3 4y ago

> I had to learn this in college, many years ago. I majored in Computer Science and Physics. Which of these disciplines would mergers and acquisitions have been in? Should my algorithms class taught us about diluted stock and RSUs vs ISOs? Does my quantum mechanics professor have a unit on hostile takeovers?

st_goliath 4y ago
I guess that'd be astrophysics: Two large piles of money circling each other, causing distant ripples on the stock market.

kasey_junk 4y ago

Hostile takeovers were much more common in the past as well.