Activision-Blizzard stockholders sue to try and stop Microsoft merger Activision-BlizzardActivision-Blizzard is set to be sold off to Microsoft for nearly $70 billion in a monumental shift for gaming. However, two stockholders are trying to halt the deal, suing Activision-Blizzard for violating the Securities Exchange Act. Activision-Blizzard\u2019s sale to Microsoft took the gaming world by storm in January 2022. With the purchased valued at nearly $70 billion, the tech giant will bring both studios underneath its ever-expanding Microsoft Gaming wing. The deal came by quickly, according to SEC filings, and there was stiff competition from other buyers. However, two stockholders are trying to thwart it all by suing Activision-Blizzard and putting an end to the purchase. Kyle Watson of Tennessee and Shiva Stein have filed two separate suits against Activision-Blizzard. Both suits claim proxy statements made are \u201cmaterially incomplete and misleading.\u201d Watson claims \u201cthe Activision Board failed to create an independent committee composed of disinterested directors to run the sales process,\u201d and instead \u201cthe Board has entered into the [merger] to procure for themselves\u2026significant and immediate benefits.\u201d If the sale goes through, executives at Activision-Blizzard will get anywhere up to $30 million of compensation, with current CEO Bobby Kotick getting $15 million, according to the SEC filing. Their lawsuit also alleges the statement made to the SEC is \u201cmaterially deficient\u201d and lacking information \u201cnecessary to make an intelligent, informed and rational decision of whether to vote [for the merger].\u201d Watson has filed for costs, as well as asking the court to stop the merger and asking Activision-Blizzard to rewrite their SEC filing to include specific information. Stein\u2019s lawsuit is much the same. However, Stein is also highlighted as being one of the most \u201cprolific\u201d securities plaintiffs in the US, filing more than 100 lawsuits from 2018 to 2020. The merger between Activision-Blizzard and Microsoft, while widely publicized, still isn\u2019t completed yet. A vote between stockholders to be held later in 2022, as well as an antitrust investigation clearing the deal, will ultimately determine its fate. In a statement to Polygon, an Activision-Blizzard spokesperson said: \u201cWe disagree with the allegations made in this complaint and look forward to presenting our arguments to the Court.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Activision-Blizzard stockholders sue to try and stop Microsoft merger Activision-BlizzardActivision-Blizzard is set to be sold off to Microsoft for nearly $70 billion in a monumental shift for gaming. However, two stockholders are trying to halt the deal, suing Activision-Blizzard for violating the Securities Exchange Act. Activision-Blizzard\u2019s sale to Microsoft took the gaming world by storm […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21786","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21786","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21786"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21786\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}