>you understand in accounting that goodwill is just the amount over the acquired company's book value that ARBA paid to acquire another company, right?< Yes, I understand that.
>You can't sell it, it is just an accounting term.< Of course you cannot sell just the goodwill, the whole company gets sold.
>It doesn't mean that there is a good feeling between any customers, it just means ARBA bought another company for more than the other company's book value.< Right, that is purchased goodwill. But I'm sure that ARBA has goodwill that is their own, since they do have an active client base, and as can be seen in the press releases, they have a steady stream of new clients.
So it doesn't matter to me whether Ariba has goodwill on the books (i.e. purchased goodwill) or not; they themselves have goodwill that is intrinsic to Ariba Corp. In any case, I don't think Ariba's business outlook is as grim as all that, that a person has to start wondering what the buyout value would be. As I stated before, I have for a long while admired the product that Ariba sells, and as long as intelligent business-people are running Ariba, they should have growing sales and earnings for a long time, both domestically and internationally. If the top brass at Ariba make too many blunders, then the company has enough market worth (including its own goodwill) to garner a price not significantly lower than where the stock is right now, and most likely higher. IMO. |
