NEW YORK - The roaring takeover market of the 1980s may be on its deathbed, but the fear of hostile bids continues to drive a number of companies to set up takeover defenses.
One of the defenses that's proving popular this year is the employee stock ownership plan. An ESOP allows a firm's management to put a block of stock in the hands of employees - a group that almost always backs management in a takeover fight.
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Marshall Field sold for $1.04B
Apr. 20, 1990
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Upscale Chicago retailer Marshall Field && Co. was sold Thursday to Dayton Hudson Corp. for a top-of-the-line price of $1.04 billion in cash.
Field's owner, BATUS Inc., the U.S. arm of Britain's BAT Industries PLC, bypassed a bid from Field's management in favor of Dayton Hudson, which BATUS says was the highest bidder.
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KKR's new challenge; Firm faced with tougher deals of '90s
July 19, 1990
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NEW YORK - Once, they seemed invincible.
Whatever the partners of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts && Co. wanted, they got. After they won the battle for the biggest takeover in history, the $25 billion leveraged buyout of RJR Nabisco, all Wall Street wondered who KKR would bag next. Suddenly, no target looked too large.
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Matsushita's new star; MCA deal finally sealed for $6.6 billion
Nov. 27, 1990
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MCA Inc., owner of Universal Pictures, and Japan's Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. made it official with a handshake and a champagne toast Monday: Matsushita will buy MCA for $71 a share, or $6.6 billion.
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Is deal slump over? Takeovers revert to cash, stock
Dec. 4, 1990
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NEW YORK - Two $6 billion-plus deals in a week. That's music to the ears of aggressive CEOs, the thinning ranks of international investment bankers and lucky investors.
After months of a slowdown in takeovers, Matsushita Electric Industrial said last week that it would buy MCA for $6.6 billion. Then, on Sunday, AT&&T Co. announced that it had bid $6 billion in stock for NCR Corp., an electronics and computer giant.
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Fleet, KKR win Bank of New England
Apr. 23, 1991
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WASHINGTON - Federal bank regulators agreed Monday to sell failed Bank of New England to Rhode Island bank Fleet/Norstar Financial Group and takeover firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts && Co.
The Fleet-KKR partnership beat out BankAmerica and Bank of Boston for Bank of New England, shut down Jan. 6 by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.
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AT&&T, NCR end battle in $7.4B deal
May 7, 1991
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NEW YORK - NCR finally agreed to be bought by American Telephone && Telegraph Monday for about $7.4 billion, or $110 a share.
The complicated stock deal, which must be approved by shareholders and regulators, should be completed in five months.
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Cable deal means business; Merger of CNBC/FNN 'opens doors'
June 18, 1991
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FORT LEE, N.J. - Just about everyone in the crowded newsroom and production offices of cable channel CNBC is giddy, overjoyed that NBC's flagship cable channel has merged with its more established rival, Financial News Network.
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Chemical, Manny Hanny to merge; More merger action expected on East Coast and in Midwest
July 16, 1991
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NEW YORK - First, NCNB Corp. and C&&S/Sovran said they might become a $116 billion asset, banking behemoth. Now Chemical Bank and Manufacturers Hanover said they're planning the biggest marriage in banking history.
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New strain of merger mania hits banks, airlines
July 17, 1991
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NEW YORK - Merger mania is back, 1990s-style.
This time it's more than a financial fad. It's a matter of survival and at the heart are banks, high-tech companies and airlines.
Struggling bank giants Chemical Bank and Manufacturers Hanover on Monday agreed to the nation's biggest bank merger in an effort to get healthy by getting bigger.
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Takeovers in recession
July 23, 1991
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The number of takeovers announced in the second quarter was up from the first quarter, but down 11% from the 577 last year.
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BankAmerica deals for Security Pacific; West Coast rivals create mega-bank
Aug. 13, 1991
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LOS ANGELES - Just when it looked like a wave of big bank mergers would knock BankAmerica from its spot as the USA's No. 2 bank, the San Francisco giant has barged back with a breathtaking deal of its own.
Monday, BankAmerica agreed to swallow Los Angeles' Security Pacific - the nation's No. 5 bank - in an exchange of stock worth about $4.2 billion.
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Delta cleared to buy most of Pan Am
Aug. 13, 1991
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NEW YORK - A federal bankruptcy judge Monday approved Delta Air Lines Inc.'s $1.4 billion bid for most of struggling Pan Am Corp., capping weeks of feverish bargaining.
Judge Cornelius Blackshear's decision promises to turn Delta into a powerhouse trans-Atlantic airline while preserving long-ailing Pan Am as a smaller airline serving only Latin America.
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NCNB, C&&S/Sovran to form mega-bank; Deal is $4.1B marriage of convenience
July 23, 1991
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ATLANTA - Hugh McColl and Bennett Brown sat side by side Monday afternoon, smiling, like the Southern gentlemen they are.
And want to appear to be.
They'd just announced the $4.1 billion merger of their two banks, NCNB and C&&S/Sovran - into what will become NationsBank, the USA's third-largest bank. And they wanted everyone to know what good friends they are, what good friends they have always been. Why, they even have beach houses one mile apart in Litchfield, S.C., where they got together over the Fourth of July weekend to hash out the deal.
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Anatomy of a takeover; LBO specialist revels in hot stock market
Dec. 12, 1991
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If you thought takeover specialists such as Kohlberg Kravis Roberts && Co. got rich in the 1980s mergers boom, just look at what they're up to now.
KKR, which invested about $57.3 million in auto-parts retailer Autozone in 1984 (about half the $115 million it paid for Autozone's parent), sold 18% of the company to the public this year for $179 million. About $80 million paid debt and other costs. The remaining $99 million went into the firm's hip pocket - leaving KKR and its investors a $42 million cash profit.
