Where Are All the Poison Pills?
The poison pill, one of the most popular corporate-takeover defenses of the past two decades, is getting tougher to swallow.
Faced with opposition from activist shareholders and new pressures to clean up governance after corporate scandals, companies are dismantling what has been one of the best known of the antitakeover mechanisms. In the past month, Circuit City Stores Inc., Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., FirstEnergy Corp., PG&E Corp., and Raytheon Co., among others, all took steps toward eliminating their pills.
So far this year, a dozen companies have taken steps to dismantle their pills, compared with 29 for all of 2003 and just 18 in 2002, according to TrueCourse Inc., which tracks corporate-takeover defenses. Although such actions typically are heaviest just ahead of the annual-meeting season in which shareholders air gripes, people who follow corporate-governance issues say the trend is likely to continue through the year.
Meanwhile, fewer companies are putting the measure in place: The rate of new poison-pill adoptions fell to a 10-year low in 2003, according to TrueCourse. About 99 companies adopted new plans in 2003, down 42% from the prior year.
While there may still be a net gain in pills this year, the figures show the sharp decline in the rate of increase. "In the current environment, there is an increasing desire by boards to be viewed as following good governance and not be entrenched," says Alan Miller, co-chairman of proxy-solicitation firm Innisfree M&A Inc. "This is the flavor of the day, and it's going to accelerate."
Many companies also appear to be backing away from another antitakeover measure: the staggered board. In this strategy, board members are elected on staggered schedules so that a hostile bidder can't throw out the entire board at once. In 2003, just under half of all newly public companies had a staggered board, down from 82% in 2002, according to TrueCourse.
But of all the takeover defenses, the poison pill long has been the weapon of choice. Created in the 1980s to thwart corporate raiders and formally known as a "shareholder-rights plan," a pill prevents a hostile takeover by making it expensive for an unwelcome suitor to acquire a large stake. More than 2,000 U.S. companies have the tool. Courts in Delaware, where most of the nation's companies are incorporated, repeatedly have blessed their use.
Many shareholders, however, complain such devices allow management to dig in when facing a takeover bid and thus don't serve shareholders. Last year, shareholders submitted more than 100 resolutions calling on companies to revoke the takeover defense or submit it to a shareholder vote. Most were nonbinding, but still won a large degree of investor support.
"The connotation among many investors is that they're bad," says Kenneth Broad, a portfolio manager at Transamerica Investment Management in San Francisco. Indeed, stock prices often fall when a company announces a new pill; in 2001, shares of Yahoo Inc. tumbled 11% when it announced it had enacted the measure.
In its most common form, poison pills are structured to flood the market with new stock once an unauthorized party acquires a large stake in the target company, usually between 10% and 20% of the shares. Once that threshold is crossed, all other shareholders get the chance to buy new, cheaply priced shares. That significantly dilutes the bidder's stake, and makes a continued bid expensive.
Still, the mechanism doesn't stop deals from happening: The tool often is used to draw a higher bid from the unsolicited suitor. Once a board approves a takeover bid, it can lift the pill so the suitor can acquire control.
In addition to yielding to shareholder pressure, deal makers say companies are dropping the takeover defense to win more favorable ratings from organizations that evaluate corporate governance; such groups typically give lower scores to companies with poison pills. A positive rating from these groups can draw new investors.
The new wave to scrap poison pills follows sporadic moves by some big companies over the years. Pfizer Corp. ditched its pill last year. Walt Disney Co., long criticized for its governance record, ended its poison pill in 1999. The company is now facing an unsolicited takeover bid from Comcast Corp.
"When everybody had them, it wasn't such an issue," says Richard Marsh, chief financial officer of FirstEnergy, which last year opposed a shareholder resolution that called for the company to drop its pill. The measure drew support of about 65% of the shares voted.
Dozens of research papers have debated pills' effectiveness; some contend pills hurt stock performance by giving the impression that a board is unwilling to consider a takeover bid at any price. Yet others have found that poison pills actually bolster a company's ability to get a good price from a bidder by preventing a low-ball offer.
A poison pill "is like a gun. In the wrong hands, it's a bad thing, but in the right hands, it's a good thing," says Transamerica's Mr. Broad.
Not everyone agrees that dismantling the pill is a good idea, even though a company can swiftly implement one after receiving an unsolicited bid.
"Fundamental corporate structures are not something that should be fiddled with in order to deal with the institutional fad of the moment," says takeover attorney Martin Lipton, who is widely credited with inventing the poison pill in 1982.
Mr. Lipton, of law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, continues to advise corporate clients to keep their poison pills intact, particularly because he expects hostile-takeover activity to increase in coming months.
"毒丸"反收购策略逐渐失宠
在过去二十年中，毒丸（poison pill，又译：股权摊薄反收购措施）一直是公司最受欢迎的反收购策略之一，现在这颗药丸正变得越来越难以吞咽。
目前众多美国公司开始弃用这一著名的反收购手段，原因是毒丸策略遭到了激进股东的反对，并且一系列公司丑闻曝光后，美国公司面临著公司治理的新压力。过去一个月中，Circuit City Stores Inc.、固特异公司(Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.)、FirstEnergy Corp.、PG&E Corp.以及雷神公司(Raytheon Co.)等公司均采取一些措施取消毒丸计划。
据跟踪反收购案例的TrueCourse Inc.提供的数据，今年到现在为止，已有十多家公司采取了弃用毒丸的措施，相比之下，2003年全年有29家，2002年只有18家。虽然这类行动往往在年度股东大会举行之前发生的最为频繁，但据研究公司治理问题的人士称，弃用毒丸的趋势可能会持续全年。
与此同时，越来越少的公司采用毒丸计划：根据TrueCourse的数据，2003年新的毒丸计划采用率降至了10年低点。大约有99家公司2003年采取了新毒丸计划，较前一年减少了42%。
虽然今年采用毒丸计划的净公司数量仍然可能占多数，但上述数据显示采用该计划的公司数量的增速急剧下滑。委托书征集公司Innisfree M&A Inc.的联合董事长阿兰?米勒(Alan Miller)说，"在目前的市场环境中，公司董事会越来越希望给外人以公司治理良好而不是层层防护的印象，这是当今的趋势，而且这一趋势将持续。"
另外，很多公司似乎在逐渐疏离另外一种反收购策略：参差董事会(staggered board)。在这种策略中，董事的任期体现参差的顺序，因此敌意收购方就不能一次驱逐整个董事会。根据TrueCourse的数据，2003年，新上市公司中只有不到一半拥有参差董事会，低于2002年的82%。
但在所有反收购案例中，毒丸长期以来就是理想武器。毒丸是上个世纪80年代产生的反收购手段，正式名称为"股权摊薄反收购措施"，毒丸计划迫使敌意收购者必须以高昂成本收购主要股份，从而达到抵制收购的目的。美国有超过2,000家公司拥有这种工具。特拉华州是多数美国公司的注册地，该州的法院多次支持了毒丸计划。
不过很多股东抱怨称，当公司在面临收购要约时，这种策略使管理层趁机巩固了其地位，而这无益于股东的利益。去年股东们递交了100多份决议，要求公司撤除毒丸计划，或交之由股东投票表决。此类决议多数并不具有约束力，但仍旧赢得了投资者很大程度的支持。
"很多投资者暗示它们（毒丸计划）很糟糕。"旧金山Transamerica投资管理公司(Transamerica Investment Management)的基金经理肯尼斯?布罗德(Kenneth Broad)说。事实是，一家公司宣布一项新的毒丸计划时，其股价往往下跌；2001年，雅虎公司(Yahoo Inc.)的股票在公司宣布实行这一计划时就下跌了11%。
在最常见的形式中，一旦未经认可的一方收购了目标公司一大笔股份（一般是10%至20%的股份）时，毒丸计划就会启动，导致新股充斥市场。一旦毒丸计划被触发，其他所有的股东都有机会以低价买进新股。这样就大大地稀释了收购方的股权，继而使收购变得代价高昂。
不过，这种办法并不能阻碍某些交易的达成：这一反收购工具往往用于抬高主动收购方的价码。一旦董事会同意了收购要约，它就会放弃毒丸方便收购方取得公司的控股权。
除了屈服于股东压力以外，并购交易撮合人还表示，公司放弃这种反收购手段是为了赢得公司治理评估机构对公司的更高评级。这些评级机构往往会给那些有毒丸计划的公司较低的评级。良好的评级会吸引新的投资者。
就在最近这股弃用毒丸计划浪潮掀起之前，在过去几年一些大公司就已经零星的放弃了这一计划。辉瑞公司(Pfizer Corp.)去年就放弃了毒丸计划。因公司治理问题长期受到诟病的沃尔特－迪斯尼公司(Walt Disney Co.)1999年就结束了毒丸计划。现在，该公司正面临康卡斯特公司(Comcast Corp.)的敌意收购。
FirstEnergy的首席财务长理查德?马什(Richard Marsh)说，"当每个公司都有这样个计划时，它就不算个问题。"FirstEnergy去年反对一项要求公司放弃毒丸计划的股东决议。支持毒丸计划的股东约有65%。
数十份研究报告对毒丸计划的有效性进行了辩证。一些报告认为，毒丸有损于股票表现，因为它给投资者留下了公司董事会对任何出价的收购均不予考虑的印象。但其他一些报告则认为，毒丸其实增强了公司从收购中获得好价钱的能力。
Transamerica的布罗德说，毒丸计划"像把双刃剑。既可以发挥积极作用，也能导致糟糕的后果。"
并不是所有人都认为弃用毒丸是个好办法，即便一家公司在接到敌意收购要约后能迅速实行毒丸计划。
因1982年发明了毒丸计划而声名鹊起的收购案律师马丁?立普顿(Martin Lipton)说，"基本的公司架构不应该为应付一时的趋势而随意变更。"
Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz律师事务所的立普顿仍建议公司保持其毒丸计划不变，特别是他预计未来数月敌意收购活动将增加。
