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Pizza Guy's finances trashed again--and a lesson in management...

zipp

Elite Member
Jun 26, 2001
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His former company has now taken the extraordinary step of trying to make it less vulnerable to a takeover attempt by implementing what's called a "poison pill". The common stock has gyrated wildly the last couple weeks for obvious reasons, but this news has trashed it by another 8-9%--hitting Pizza Guy in the wallet today by about $40 million more. Anyone regretting this guy's loss as a big U of L donor is sweating over nothing. He's probably getting a yacht or helicopter repo'd as we speak.

This is good news for me because I shorted the stock a week or so back when it jumped in price on news of his exit. That company's got issues at this point that run far deeper than whether the Papa's in the house. A poison pill is a senior management attempt to entrench itself in power and control when it thinks someone else might try to take it over. Management will argue the merits (like discouraging Pizza Guy's return), but it's not shareholder friendly as evidenced by today's stock action. In addition to killing Snotter, what's left of Papa John's management is killing all of its shareholders.

How can this be when Pizza Guy was the problem? Answer: Pizza Guy wasn't their only problem. And how could he be? He recruited most of the clowns--heard that word before?--who worked alongside him in his inner circle. Most of them probably deserved to be in senior management at Papa John's as much as he did. Trying to protect themselves at the mercy of shareholders is evidence of that.

So don't shed any tears for the company that bears Pizza Guy's name even though they're trying to distance themselves from him as much as possible. Don't tell me that Snotter left in his wake a bunch of innocents at Papa Johns. And don't tell me that he and Postel did the same thing at U of L, or that Grissom's exit will complete our own repairs. That's the delusion of someone trying to quickly--and erroneously--get past a problem. These are large organizations that weren't managed at the detail level by one or two corrupt, incompetent people.

IOW, don't drink the Kool-Aid that Neeli's trying to serve you...
 
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