Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer announces she’s given birth to twin girls

The company shelved plans to spin off its stake in Chinese online retailer Alibaba amid pressure from activist investors anxious about billions of dollars in taxes.

A day after Yahoo announced plans to spin off its core internet business, CEO Marissa Mayer has announced she’s given birth to identical twin girls. Suitors might include AT&T Inc., Verizon Communications, Comcast Corp., IAC/InterActiveCorp and private equity firms that specialize in buying troubled companies. “The board remains committed to accomplishing the significant business purposes and shareholder benefits that can be realized by separating the Alibaba stake from the rest of Yahoo”, stated Maynard Webb, the chairman of Yahoo’s board.

Those remarks seemed to disappoint investors hoping that Yahoo’s latest change in course might be a precursor to a sale. The shares have fallen by 32 per cent so far this year. Te plan, expected to sharply cut back some of Yahoo’s operations and likely reduce the workforce of some 11,000, would create “greater transparency to ensure that Yahoo’s business operations are accurately valued”, Ms Mayer said.

In a bid to satisfy the Internal Revenue Service’s (IRS’s) tax-free spin-off rules that the transaction be carried out for a business objective, with the requirement that a new entity should house an “active trade or business”, Aabaco would have also controlled Yahoo Small Business, which helps U.S. merchants set up websites. Rock star at Google has had three years to do turnaround Mayer joined Yahoo in July 2012 from Google, where she was a rock star product manager and developer (Google Earth, search and others).

The company’s buyback program spiraled, when Mayer took over, to its current level of $35 per share.

Yahoo’s board of directors made the decision, “after careful review and consideration of how to best drive long-term value for shareholders”.

“The narrative around Yahoo and our valuation is complicated”, Mayer said Wednesday during an appearance on the financial news channel CNBC. If Yahoo is taxed on the gains in its original $1 billion investment, the bill would exceed more than $10 billion. Yahoo announced now that they no longer plan to spin off their Alibaba Stake due to possible tax implications.

Based on its cash holdings and its investment in Yahoo Japan, Yahoo’s market value suggests that the core operations are worthless or may even have a negative value.