mr. ackman got the information from valiant, not allergan, it is not fraud. so the -- mr. n knows more than other investors in the market? but he got the information legitimately from valiant. >> but you have to admit, it smell s bad, back in the '80s, e got information on others who attempted to buy the company, shares would pop, company would buy those shares back from that person. we call that green mail, i'm not saying that is where bill ackman is going with this, but there is a precedent on him making a bid, and profiting. is there a need for a new rule to prohibit that kind of trading? what do you think? >> well you mentioned in your lead-in to the story that the green mail practices of the '80s, part of the reaction to that was the innovation of the poison pill, which protects companies to a considerable extent from having to pay green mail. once they have adopted the poison pill they can sit still and ignore mr. ackman if they do not want to proceed with the merger. so the question would be whether investors should be entitled to know about large accumulations of st

mr. ackman, because he was doing his over-the-counter. these were somebody else doing them in the market yesterday, probably somebody that got tipped off to this deal. >> jon, it's joe. i mean, i did, back in the day, did a bunch of otc transactions. would you suspect it's the other side of who's doing the otc transaction with mr. ackman, just going on the options market itself and trying to hedge out their exposure? >> in fact, joe, you're right. but that would be the first place i'd look. and given that there are two firms involved here, of course, ackman and valeant, and the fact that somebody had to provide that liquidity for mr. ackman, the people providing that liquidity were probably buying stock, because, like i say, the volumes picked up, but not to the point where they hit yesterday, up until yesterday. they were relatively modest, which means that whoever was trading them yesterday, joe, was probably somebody cheating, was probably, again, if you know a large customer's buying a lot of calls, that doesn't mean that you know a t

mr. ackman who filed with his position in the stock last night.id follow up that answer with the question well, you're stepping off the board which will, of course, allow them to sell the stock. are you going to do that? he said no, we have no plans to sell the stock and he -- as mr. ackman did during his presentation listed all of the reasons he believes valeant is a very, very strong acquirer for allergan in terms of so many other things. we have got a long way to go on what should be an interesting fight here. but no down jeff eacon is taking an important seat. >> no plans to sell, huh, david? i'll believe it when i see it. >> i have a question. i'm sure you noticed or it was talked about that they missed the window to nominate directors what would have blood pressure a powerful move. what did they say about that? >> yeah. i mean, as you know, there's no chance for them to show up at the might meeting. you can act -- i think it's 25% to call a special meeting, you need 50% throughout the board. i think they're going to rely more on the sharehol

mr. ackman that we have gotten today. the leaks of which started around 4:01 or 4:02. take a look at allergan stock price to see what it has been doing as ackman's purchasing square bought a good deal of stock. crossed the 5% threshold about ten days ago and had that window to ramp up to get near 10% stake. for valeant which is the aggressor here, this is the company that continues to acquire. when it does so, it acquires a company. it cuts out all of r and d and guts a lot of the cost structure of the company and benefits from having a non-u.s. tax regime. it is not a u.s. tax filer. it's another one of those tax inversions. that's what they're saying will be the case here as well. again, i'm hearing that this offer will comprise two-thirds stock, one-third cash. they will be talking about synergies roughly worth about $25 to $30 a share. certainly some questions. if you recall, the last large acquisition that valeant mounted was for bausch and lom. will there be any trust scrutiny or problems is one question. allergan i'm expecting is going to fight. it's difficult to

mr. ackman's latest move could make him a lot of money, but a lot of investors are screaming insider tradingey do it this way? kate kelly is there to talk with us about it. >> despite his penchant for publicity, bill ackman knows how to navigate quietly. he did it through the over-the-counter options market, giving him the economic equivalent of the 10% long position that dom was talking about without the reporting requirements of buying actual stock far in advance. doing that could well have triggered the need for regulatory filings that would have alerted allergan of ackman's plans and no doubt raise the stock price along the way as public investors became more aware, but still trying to build that important 9.7% stake. critics are crying foul, sake ackman clearly had inside knowledge of the takeover plans and that, by teaming up with the takeover company itself, he was able to effectively create his own destiny here, since this is an attractive deal that stands a pretty good chance of getting done. the stocks are popping in the interim. a regular joe investor would never have had perhaps

mr. ackman and his team have contributed $4 billion towards our cause, they can be an independent voice. they are the largest shareholder we have. finally, in terms of the probability of this deal being done, having a third-party validating our business model that truly believes the combination of this for the short-term and long-term, that is a huge asset. >> the deal is very complex. they basically purchased 30 million allergan shares and announced a plan to purchase the whole company with stock surges. if the deal goes through at the offered price, ackman and valiant will save $830 million on the deal. he explained his thinking this morning on "market makers." >> as soon as we get a fruitful, we will acquire the underlying shares. this is the exact same economic exposure is if we owned the stock. >> we don't want to partner with everyone, right? we want to partner with the best management in the industry, the industry that we like. this is not about making a pop on a stock. this is about establishing a large position in the combined company, an attractive position not just for us, but

mr. ackman who, you know, clearly a smart man, and he shorted the stock.at point he wants to talk it down and, you know, raise doubts and, you know, anything to get that stock price down. it's a problem. liz: yeah. and now you've got a senator, david -- [laughter] who was interested in getting involved in this. senator markey of massachusetts who had a very long meeting, apparently, with bill ackman even while other constituents were waiting outside to talk to him about other things. it just makes you wonder if you can buy access like bill ackman has. and here's carl can along with george -- icon along with george soros, he opportunity even drink the shakes. is it best to stay away from this, david? >> balls and strikes are called properly by the federal enforcement agencies. they're not going to be influenced too much by a congressional inquiry. and i think people should take a careful look and make sure they're making a good judgment, but i don't think the existence of an ftc investigation should get stockholders to shy away from herbalife. >> first, thi

mr. ackman when he doubled down, he bought a lot of the gm puts. >> in terms of engineerings is there an engineering aspect? >> of course. >> the short interest will be -- >> of course, there's an engineering aspect of this and it's a battle of the tigtans. i would stay out of this if i was an individual investor. i think mr. icahn is going to get the best on this side, my personal opinion. >> shares of bank of america under heavy pressure after suspending a stock buy back plan. the fed is requiring to resubmit capital plans after the bank made an error. jeff hart follows bank of america. great to see you with us. >> good to be here. >> this is reputational. isn't the business of a bank of an investment bank that does investment banking business to calculate things correctly? they didn't do it for themselves. >> this may be an indicate caio how much more complex it has gotten. 27 basis points have changed. by suspending the buyback a couple of quarters they eventually get that back. it's not life-threatening. the stocks sold off a lot. i'm still having trouble getting exciting. you now h

mr. ackman teaming up with valeant kind of changes the deal landscape. is this an indication that the m av & a may change? >> we have seen a trend of active investors being more broadly involved in long-term transactions and strategic investments. certainly this, you know, is a compelling and striking example of that. i think the other is last year we saw $77 billion in m & a transactions in life sciences. the average deal size was up 49%. we're clearly going to blow through those numbers against this year. >> so talk to me about the consolidatation that's going on in the industry. you know, it seems to me that it's all about scale. >> yes. >> and the fact that they all have patents that are going to expire. so if they have to deal with that and don't have a great pipeline, they can buy the pipeline, correct? >> absolutely. i think you're absolutely right. it's about scale, about being a dominant global leader by market share. it's about maximizing efficiency. this industry is growing locally globally around the world, so these synergies are required to

mr. ackman earlier in the week. >> thanks, pete. >> for the record, guy, you don't do any self tanning.his is your natural hue. >> it's my natural hue. i'm half italian, half sicilian. said it a thousand times on this show. i have nice skin. >> only natural juices and berries. >> you need to use facial scrub. no kidding, really. >> time for the final trade. let's go around the horn. pete? >> the dollar names are both very active. family dollar but i'm going to dollar general today. >> grasso. >> bank america. sold out of my position waiting to get back in around $15 is where i'm looking entry. >> josh. >> agricultural still looks the strongest in the market. i'm staying long, m-o-o. >> guy. >> this is a fun show. >> fun, fun, fun. >> mylan labs. >> staying in the medical space. >> a nice day on the tape. >> coming up on mad money, cramer is defining the stocks defying the tape. thanks for watching "fast." we'll see you back here on monday. have a great weekend. we helped sydney manage her debt and prioritize her goals, so she could really turn up the volume on her dreams today...and tom

mr. ackman, for instance, does a lot of homework, does a lot of research into the company and comes to the board saying this is what i found out, what we think you should do. how much of the role of the activist has, i'd say, you know, stimulated more board substitution? >> or the other way around. how often is it the board doesn't do its job so activists can step up and do it for them? i think a well-functioning board that pushes back on management, that challenges that offers alternatives without micromanaging but offers alternatives for management to think about are the companies that are least likely to be under attack by activists investors. >> brad? >> yeah. i'd like to react. i think what stuart's saying is nonsensical. you know, an activist investor often has an agenda. that agenda is often very short term in focus. you know, the idea that the activist investor is doing the job that the board should be doing is completely illogical. and in a lot of cases an activist investor is simply talking their own book. they're promoting an agenda without really understanding the company or ha

mr. ackman in the twitter question of the day. if you were bill ackman, what would you target next? he has been very busy whether it is netflix or herbalife. we steer away from the corporate world and go to politics. joe biden in kiev to show solidarity with the ukraine. his message is we want to be your friend, your partner. john kerry warning there will be consequences. script.t to rip up the what did you learn on your european trip? >> that google maps is superior to apple map. quietseems to be calm and after the european debt crisis from a couple of years ago. you do not sense the panic. at least in italy. >> your children were well behaved? >> they were well behaved. very cool you drag your children around euro. a dead market. how will the economy performed? summer, fall and winter of 2000 14. robert roberson has seen quiet times before. guest host. she strategist at sandler o'neill. also joining us is jon erlichman. what the title. that is so cool. chief senior west coast correspondent in charge of the sunset tower bar for me when i am out there. looking at the markets. they a

mr. ackman to take the position on its own and the answer might be yes, but in acting with mr. kman, perhaps they -- he gets the toe hold for them and validates their currency. of all the reasons that may be the main one. he is going to hold $1.5 billion or more of stock after the deal occurs if it occurs. he's going to take his allocation all in stock or at least elect for it, he may get cash, it's one third, two thirds in terms of stock to cash ratio and he will be a significant shareholder in the combination should it occur. but you're right, jim, it does look funny in that he can put up a little over $3 billion. by the way, they both needed to file hsr. he took about $75 million worth of stock and bought the rest through these very low cost options which is one strategy to do it. the reason the stock moved is you had the -- you had -- the people ginchts options had to buy the stock and allergan's stock moved up from an unaffected stock price from 116 to 148 during the period of furious buying he did after he passed the 5% threshold. but you're right, i mean to come back to y

mr. ackman to get it done. >> so you are a major owner of the company at that point? myself in circles. >> you don't know whether you are going to be successful. if he buys it, he could easily use all of his money. allergan says no. it's not a done deal. i think allergan would be hostile anyway. you don't know the prospects. >> i'm guessing if he had announced his stake without any parp, i think given his representation the market would like that as well. you bought it as it is running out. >> i bought my 10%. then we will announce you and i and a bunch of others are going to buy it. and that runs it up. >> that's legal too though. >> it feels a little different to me. you're right if this was just an announcement without valeant. >> i'm guessing you have good legal counsel as well. >> it feels different to me. >> there's no guarantee a deal would be done. >> comcast out with quarterly numbers early this hour. earning 68 cents a share. it was well above expectation. looming price increase after solid first quarter results. earning 86 cents a share. rich greenfield is

ackman at a bar -- having beverage of his choice and i saw mr. ichan cross central park south. behink carl was going to healthy. >> going for his morning constitution. >> but just people. >> at the end of the day, where all people. >> those are our front-page story. tom? >> and tom is somewhere in the middle of the second and third page. >> i'm reading about the nba, i don't get it. value of takeovers and not for 2014 reached the one trillion mark, reaching that level the fastest pace since time began, seven years. our next -- guest host has a biblical understanding, chairman and managing partner of sunshine --sonenshine and partners. give me your book -- no one shows up to "bloomberg surveillance" --look at that. >> show the label. bloomberg. >> marshall, thank you. >> he wanted me to come on. i had one of my associates give me some stuff and i read. >> let me cut to the chase. have you ever seen anything like it as silly as it is? >> four months into the year and hit a chilean dollars, so a run rate of $3 trillion in global m&a. -- we had a trillion dollars. m&a was the last

from yesterday, of course, the hostile bid from valeant and partnership with bill ackman for allergan. how could i not ask mrtuation involving somebody he has not quite seen eye to eye with in the past. >> with all the stuff i've said with ackman back and forth, i think he's dead wrong about herbalife and we have our differences, but i never said he's not a smart guy. >> right. >> and i think the concept of this is good. i hope it works out better for him than herbalife did. i think will. but that doesn't mean there's something wrong with that. what's wrong with making a bid for a company and using somebody's funds? what's the difference whose funds it is? >> well, it's legal. there are a number of people who feel like it's front running almost. obviously he -- i want to make it clear, it's legal, he's a group, a partnership, valeant. >> i never thought i would be here defending ackman. he agreed to put $3 billion in, the little i read of it, i might be wrong. >> put his own capital at risk. >> put his capital at risk and they told him buy some stock. >> right. >> that's not illegal in my mind. >> it's not.

advocate is siding with investors like bill ackman who say the federal government cannot wind down the housing giants without paying off its shareholders. spoke to mrnusual alliance. siding with wall street -- that's the strangest bedfellows i've ever heard. ralph nadery not style. he's usually taking on wall street's biggest players. he says this case is different. he is a longtime shareholder in the mortgage finance giant eared t.crease of bill ackma he agrees with bill ackman. >> that shareholders have been used and abused. they were thrown into a conservatorship in 2008. right after the chairman of the federal reserve assured the shareholders of fannie and freddie that the companies were rocksolid. took weeks later, they over conservatorship and the stocks plunged. they deceived the shareholders. corporations did that, the sac would d get after them. this needs to be cricket. along with much stronger regulation of fannie and freddie and enforcement -- >> taxpayers buildout these companies. why shouldn't they be the ones who benefit from the process? get first call. they have paid back more than they have supported fannie and freddie. the profit

ackman. will be to what he said this morning on "squawk on the street." i heard it -- no. okay, basically -- we don't have the sound, mrom line, he said, how is it legal for -- okay, we're going to play it now. >> how does someone kind of basically know that there's going to be a bid and be allowed to accumulate stock? classically, that would be front money. if we had an s.e.c. that was on the case, i think that they would opine on this. they're not going to. this is going to be blessed, i believe. everything's going to be fine. it's unfortunate because i don't think it is the way that things should be done. but being right and being legal are two different things. >> what do you think? is it illegal? >> i don't think there's enough of a basis to suggest that what happened is illegal. one would have to know when ackman started negotiating with valiant. but what is clear is that prior to his consummating an actual deal with valiant, he was in the marketplace, and my suspicion is the s.e.c. will look at that. and try to determine the facts to see whether he was front running valiant's bid. that's the real issue. >> here'