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Non-Tech : Kirk's Market Thoughts -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Kirk © who wrote (1100)	4/28/2014 10:12:18 AM
From: Kirk ©	Respond to of 26768

From "Pfizer Confirms AstraZeneca Approach" (do Google search for direct link to the full WSJ article) U.S. Drug Giant Considering Options LONDON— Pfizer Inc. PFE +3.37% confirmed Monday that it made a renewed approach to AstraZeneca AZN.LN +15.56% PLC regarding a takeover valued at nearly $100 billion, but the U.K.-listed pharmaceutical firm had declined to engage in talks. ... The indicative price would value AstraZeneca at about £58.73 billion, or $98.68 billion. AstraZeneca's shares were up 14.6% to £46.77 in afternoon London trading Monday. .... AstraZeneca also detailed Pfizer's proposal from January, in which the £46.61 offer would consist of 70% Pfizer shares and 30% cash. AstraZeneca said that in January its board raised concerns about the large proportion of Pfizer shares in the offer, as well as concerns over Pfizer's proposal to redomicile in the U.K. for tax purposes. Pfizer said that if the deal goes ahead the two companies would be combined under a new U.K.-incorporated holding company, with management in both the U.S. and U.K. It would maintain its head office in New York and list its shares on the New York Stock Exchange. ... Mr. Read said Pfizer had contacted the U.K. government about a potential deal that morning, adding that its policy actions have created an attractive environment for inward investment into the U.K. and that a deal "would bring an injection of around $100 billion into the U.K. economy."

To: Kirk © who wrote (1100)	4/28/2014 10:26:13 AM
From: robert b furman	1 Recommendation Recommended By Investor Clouseau Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 26768

A man on Bloomberg "Surveillance said that all of the recent Pharma mergers are all designed around avoiding the excessive US corporate tax rates. Valeant buying alergan was an example and the last huge Pharma deal was to save 6 points on taxation. As our politician argue about welth transfers - the wealth of corporate America is sliping out of the country. These corrupt fools had better wake up. The time to run our country as a business and not a social experiment has arrived. This November will be a pivotal moment in US politics - I HOPE !! Amat merging with Tokyo Electron and becoming a Netherlands corporation is another example. Bob Here's the gist as Washington DC sleepe: Executives at a California chip maker, Applied Materials, highlighted a number of advantages in announcing a merger recently with a smaller Japanese rival, but an important one was barely mentioned: lower taxes. The merged company will save millions of dollars a year by moving — not to one side of the Pacific or the other, but by reincorporating in the Netherlands. From New York to Silicon Valley, more and more large American corporations are reducing their tax bill by buying a foreign company and effectively renouncing their United States citizenship. “It’s almost like the holy grail,” said Andrew M. Short, a partner in the tax department of Paul Hastings, which advises a number of American corporations on deals. “We spend all of our time working for multinationals, thinking about how we’re going to expand their business internationally and keep the taxation of those activities offshore,” he added. Reincorporating in low-tax havens like Bermuda, the Cayman Islands or Ireland — known as “inversions” — has been going on for decades. But as regulation has made the process more onerous over the years, companies can no longer simply open a new office abroad or move to a country where they already do substantial business. Instead, most inversions today are achieved through multibillion-dollar cross-border mergers and acquisitions. Robert Willens, a corporate tax adviser, estimates there have been about 50 inversions over all. Of those, 20 occurred in the last year and a half, and most of those were done through mergers. When Applied Materials announced its deal for Tokyo Electron, it said that its effective tax rate would drop to 17 percent from 22 percent as a result. For a company that had nearly $2 billion in profit in 2011, that amounts to savings of about $100 million a year.j