Kara Swisher

Recent Posts by Kara Swisher

As Its Stock Languishes, Yahoo Tries $3 Billion Buyback to Juice Shares

As BoomTown wrote last week, Yahoo’s stock has performed poorly over the last year.

Let’s go to the numbers: Yahoo (YHOO) is down 9.8 percent for the month and 17.5 percent YTD.

And while most digital stocks are off in 2010–except for the soaring Apple (AAPL)–Yahoo’s shares performed the worst year over year, down 11.6 percent, compared to a decline of 3.2 percent for Microsoft (MSFT) and an increase of 5.5 percent for Google (GOOG).

The message from investors to CEO Carol Bartz’s efforts to turn around the fortunes of the Internet giant: Meh.

So, today, the company is trying to do something about that via a board authorization to repurchase $3 billion in shares over the next three years.

In its regulatory filing, Yahoo said the transactions could “take place in the open market or in privately negotiated transactions.”

Naturally, the move caused an initial jump in Yahoo stock in after-hours trading, up just under one percent to $13.93.

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Just as the atom bomb was the weapon that was supposed to render war obsolete, the Internet seems like capitalism’s ultimate feat of self-destructive genius, an economic doomsday device rendering it impossible for anyone to ever make a profit off anything again. It’s especially hopeless for those whose work is easily digitized and accessed free of charge.

— Author Tim Kreider on not getting paid for one’s work