An average acquisition then:

acquirer pays a premium to nudge the acquiree's board to approve

acquirer's shareholders that disagree with the deal sell, in anticipation of value destruction

not so much "nudge the target's board to approve" as "allow the target board to approve"

a board that approves a 0% premium (barring unusual exceptions) will be sued to oblivion

Cisco cash is flowing out to Splunk shareholders so it makes sense that its equity value is X% lower after announcement

There are ~4bn Cisco shares outstanding. CSCO is down $2. So the market thinks that Cisco is overpaying by $8bn, or a 33 percent premium. Seems pretty bang on to me. Score one for the efficient market hypothesis.

“the market thinks” is an expression that makes me cringe. The market does not think, it’s the result of multiple actions, which many many people pretend they can explain or even predict when really they cannot.

"the market thinks” gives the stock trade market an aura of reason and intelligence which it absolutely does not deserve for many historical reasons. Trading as it exists today is unhinged capitalism, it’s a cancer on our societies as it widens the gap between rich and poor. It should be taxed, something like an Automated Payment Transaction tax, to make high frequency or even medium frequency trading simply unrentable.

I’m not against the concept of stocks in general, but the way it operates now is simply sick, I don’t see how to phrase this differently.

Can evolution be attributed thought or more generally consciousness?

All cash, too. Splunk was like, Cisco equity? Nah.

$28 BILLION? Splunk???? my god