Microsoft and Yahoo: What now?

It sure feels like the Microsoft-Yahoo negotiations have been going on forever, but judging by the looks of it, it seems like there isn't going to be a Microhoo to speak of after all. Sure, Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang has been making some interesting allusions in the press following the tumble that his company's stock price has experienced ("We were totally willing to do a transaction, and they walked away," he told the Financial Times) but despite his urgings that he was open to a deal, it seems that there won't be one. So, what now? According to Ars Technica, a deal of another sort. "Having failed to deliver Jerry Yang's proverbial head on a silver platter and bringing Yahoo under his domain, [Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer] needs to show his own shareholders that the whole mating dance wasn't just wasted time and money while management could have been doing something better with its talents and assets," Ars writes. "So I would be surprise--no, shocked--if Microsoft didn't announce another rather large acquisition very soon."

For more on the post deal shakeout:
- see this Ars Technica article
- also check out this article in FierceFinance