Holmes on the Greenmail Weekend

Holmes takes the greenmail weekend from Storming the Magic Kingdom, by John Taylor. Watson: Steinberg lost his nerve, surely? Holmes: chapter nine; Friday he bids sixty-seven fifty, barely above market, and Disney's lawyers plant a bluff, a self-tender at eighty. Sunday, he sold: three hundred twenty-five million, seventy-seven fifty a share; profit thirty-one point seven million after expenses. Lestrade: so Disney won? Holmes: below forty-six within the week.

The strongest case in Storming the Magic Kingdom is the greenmail weekend of June 1984: on the Friday Saul Steinberg's shell company announced a tender at $67.50 a share, only $2.50 above the market; Disney's lawyers planted word through Larry Tisch that management was out of control and would self-tender at $80, drowning the company in debt; on the Sunday Steinberg sold for $77.5 a share, $325.5 million in all, $28 million of it for his expenses, clearing $31.7 million; and when trading reopened the stock opened $7 lower and was below $46 within the week, so the shareholders who were not Steinberg paid for the peace.

On the book: Storming The Magic Kingdom - Wall Street, The Raiders, and the Battle for Disney by John Taylor

Starring

Sherlock HolmesDr. WatsonInspector Lestrade