SiliconBeat

Oracle has decided to dedicate as much as $8 billion more to its stock repurchase program, raising the total available to it to $9.3 billion, according to a regulatory filing it made with the SEC today. The stock buyback is intended to help offset its employee stock plans as well as help it buy shares “opportunistically” — when they are selling at prices to low for the company to resist.

The company spent $7.14 billion buying back 24.1 million shares in its fiscal 2008 fourth quarter ended May 31, paying an average of $20.76 per shares. Oracle’s stock hit a 52-week low of $15.28 per share earlier this month. They gained $1.14, or 6.7 percent in regular trading Monday before the share repurchase was announced. They gained 29 cents, or 1.6 percent, more in after hours trading, according to Yahoo Finance.

PDL Biopharma, the Redwood City biotechnology company that has been struggling to satisfy disgruntled shareholders by selling off assets and laying off workers for more than a year, said in an SEC filing Monday that royalty payments it had expected to start receiving before the end of its current quarter, won’t be coming any time soon.

In its quarterly financial statement filed in August, PDL had said it expected to start receiving royalty revenues Read the rest of this entry »

The board at PDL Biopharma, which has sold more than a half billion dollars’ worth of assets to assuage disgruntled investors, has decided to spread some of the cash around. On Friday, the company reported that non-employee directors would get a raise to better compensate for their ongoing efforts “to sell or otherwise monetize” the company’s assets,” including a possible spin-off of some of PDL’s product lines into a separate public company, according to an SEC filing Friday.

Non-employee directors will get an additional Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s the latest in the ongoing saga at PDL BioPharma. The company “eliminated” the position of interim chief executive officer Wednesday. “As a result” the company reported in a filing with the SEC late on Thursday “”L. Patrick Gage’s tenure in that position terminated” the same day. He also resigned from the company’s board “due to differences of opinion among the Board members over the prioritization of PDL’s objectives.” That same day board chair Karen Dawes resigned “for personal reasons.” Read the rest of this entry »

Google amended its proxy Monday to update information about one of the directors on its board and chair of it audit committee, Ann Mather (pictured below), who joined its board in November 2005, which might be of interest to its shareholders in advance of their meeting. Read the rest of this entry »

A month after it said it said it had given up the idea of selling itself, PDL Biopharma approved new severance benefits and retention bonuses for four executives according to a filing Tuesday with the SEC.

Read the rest of this entry »

Our colleague Steve Johnson gives us an update on the dismantling of PDL BioPharma. In today’s Mercury News, Johnson writes:

“Following up on its vow to raise money by selling its drugs to other companies, PDL BioPharma of Redwood City announced Monday that a Japanese company has agreed to buy a PDL drug used in bone marrow transplants for $200 million in cash.”

After months of squabbling with shareholder activist Daniel Loeb, PDL seemed to be getting some breathing room when Loeb sold the rest of his stock last month.

But what’s this? In a schedule 13-D filed on Tuesday, the fine folks at Highland Capital Management disclosed that they’ve been gobbling up PDL stock. So far, they’ve spent $206.1 million and they now own 8.1 percent.

Wonder what they want?

We’ve been following the soap opera known as PDL BioPharma for the past few months. Here’s a guest post and update from our loyal correspondent and colleague Steve Johnson:

A disgruntled investor whose complaints helped prompt the board of Redwood City-based PDL BioPharma (ticker:PDLI) to oust their chief executive and put the company up for sale disclosed Friday that he no longer owns any PDL shares.

Earlier this summer, Daniel Loeb, chief executive of New York City hedge fund Third Point, controlled about 10 percent of PDL’s common stock. But he has been selling those shares in recent weeks and said in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that he had unloaded the last of his PDL stock on Friday. For about a year, Loeb has been at war with PDL’s management over what he contended was “egregiously bad business judgment” by former chief executive.

Mark McDade, who was forced to announce his resignation in August, and PDL’s board are now seeking a buyer for the firm. Loeb could not be reached for comment. But PDL spokeswoman Kathleen Rinehart said Loeb’s decision to sell his shares should not have any major effect on the company. “It doesn’t change our plans,” she said. “We’re still continuing our efforts with the sale process.”

Poor, poor PDL BioPharma (ticker: PDLI). As we’ve blogged about in recent weeks, the company’s CEO stepped down under pressure from Third Point, one of its largest shareholders. And while Third Point still has concerns,  it’s also been reducing its holdings in recent weeks.

But here comes a new antagonist. On Wednesday, Highland Capital Management, a Dallas-based fund, filed a schedule 13-D disclosing that it’s been gobbling up PDL stock in recent weeks and now owns 6. 1 million shares that cost about $145 million, giving it control of 5.2 percent of the company.

The filing also disclosed a letter the firm sent to PDL’s board stating several requests. Chief among those: They want Dr. Patrick Gage to resign as Chairman of the Board of Directors. Gage just took over as interim CEO following the resignation of former CEO Mark McDade.

The letter is dated Sept. 25. Apparently it’s just being released now because Highland has increased its stake above 5 percent. So we’ll see how Gage handle’s a two-front assault from Highland and Three Point.

PDL BioPharma filed the terms of its employment agreement Tuesday with interim chief executive, L. Patrick Gage, who took over Oct. 1 after PDL’s previous CEO, Mark McDade quit following a long and bitter dispute with the company’s biggest shareholder, Third Point, a New York City hedge fund.

Gage, who had previously served as chairman of PDL’s board, will get $650,000 annually and is eligible for a bonus worth up to 75 percent of his salary. He will also be granted an option to buy 100,000 shares, effective two trading days after the company releases results for its quarter ended Sept. 30, which is scheduled for Thursday.

Gage, who is 65 and a venture partner with Flagship Ventures based in Cambridge, Mass., will be paid up to $5,000 per month for the costs of a temporary residence here, and while he’s looking for that will also be reimbursed for “reasonable food and hotel lodging expenses” until November 15, 2007 for trips to the Bay Area.

(Hmmm, Boston or San Francisco for the winter? You decide.)

PDL will also cover the expense of up to two round-trip airline flights per month between the Bay Area and any airport in “reasonable proximity to his current home” and will pay the costs for a rental car while he’s here.

The compensation committee also approved an extra payment of $12,500 to Gage for his service as chairman from Aug. 19 to Sept. 28, that was in addition the compensation he was already entitled to as a non-employee director and chairman. (He was paid $53,500 in fees and given a stock grant valued at $152,080 in 2006.) As an employee, Gage will no longer receive extra compensation for his service as a director.

The company sent its offer letter to Gage on Oct. 24, but four days later the offer was revised after discussions with Gage, who perhaps was having buyers remorse. The revision included a provision so that if Gage were to resign as an employee of the company but continue to serve on its board, the number of vested shares in his new-hire option grant would be immediately increased by 50,000, and the vesting date would be set back to Oct. 1, 2007, instead of the grant date following the earnings release.

Earlier this month the querulous shareholder, Third Point, sold 5.3 million shares of PDL for $116.9 million, cutting its stake in the company to 5.1 percent from 9.7 percent.

Third Point Chief Executive Daniel Loeb sent the PDL board a letter after the sales saying that, despite the encouraging news of the board’s efforts to sell the company, it was “disappointed that the sale processis still being led by a Board that does not include a Third Point representative, and that Patrick Gage remains the Company’s CEO, despite having demonstrated his unsuitability.”

Loeb went on to say that Third Point remains one of PDL’s largests shareholders. “We will be carefully watching developments, and assessing our options, as events unfold.”