Up The Ying Yang

And I thought I had poor financial judgment. Wow. Steve Yang and the rest of guys at Yahoo turned down a very decent 33 dollar per share offer earlier this year, because they thought the company was worth way more. Wrong. Yahoo is trading at $14, which is actually pretty good right now, and Microsoft says its no longer interested. If Yang hadn’t played hardball he would have looked like a genius about now.

What’s so interesting about this story is the way that Yang has been totally played by Steve Ballmer of Microsoft, who was has been in a no lose situation from the get-go. By suggesting that Yahoo was still for sale to Microsoft the other day, Yang was in essence saying he’d lost the battle – in public – and must have known what was coming next from a ball breaker like Ballmer, who threw him the proverbial anvil, and sent Yahoo’s already depressed stock price into the tank.

Where does Yahoo go from here. The answer has to be nowhere. It’s at times like these that CEOs who give up golden opportunities because of sheer ego tend to be let go. At least – with the money he has left in the bank, Yang can look forward to a long and fruitful retirement – unlike those who’s 401ks include Yahoo stock. As the McCain-Palin team said during the election campaign, “C’est la vie”.