Friday, August 6, 2010

BARNES & NOBLE FOR SALE

The Wall Street Journal reported this week that New York-based company Barnes & Noble is up for sale, according to the article, “succumbing to pressure from shareholder activists as digital books erode the traditional business of the nation’s largest bookstore chain.”

Apparently, the company told WSJ that its founder and chairman, Leonard Riggio, is considering forming an investor group to buy Barnes & Noble. The company currently has 720 stores and sells approximately 300 million books annually.

The article reports that “Barnes & Noble has a market capitalization of just under $950 million—even after a 25% run-up in after-hours trading Tuesday [August 3, 2010] in the wake of the announcement. In comparison, chief competitor Amazon.com Inc. has a market cap of around $55 billion. In 2001, Barnes & Noble was worth $2.2 billion and Amazon $3.6 billion.”

1 comment:

Marja Verschoor-Meijers said...

I can only hope it's a rumour...