4 onverwachte schokken

Een interessant stuk van [ Harvard Business Publishing ] over onverwachte schokken. Het geeft 4 voorbeelden.

"1. Back in 1988, media mogul Rupert Murdoch paid $3 billion to acquire TV Guide. A few days, ago, after passing through the hands of several owners, TV Guide was sold to private investors for the price of $1. That's right. . . [ investors bought the whole company for less than the price of a single issue! ]

2. After 68 consecutive quarters (that's 17 years) of profitability, Southwest Airlines finally posted a money-losing quarter in the period ending September 30. The problem? Fuel prices were declining too quickly! As a result, [ Southwest had to write down the value of the fuel-hedging contracts that had served it so well for so many years ]. Sometimes being smarter than everyone else actually costs you money.

3. General Motors now has a stock-market value of $3.5 billion--just a bit more than what TV Guide was worth 20 years ago. GM also has $20 billion of cash on its balance sheet. What does it say about GM's future when you can spend $3.5 billion to buy a pile of cash worth $20 billion--and [ GM can't find an investor willing to take a stake? ]

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[ Bron: Harvard Business Publishing ]