I haven’t commented on the MSFT/YHOO thing because, well there seemed to be no lack of opinions so why bother. Having said that, this response from Yahoo is pretty lame… they probably should have just come out and said “we need time to put together some friendly counter offers”.

Yahoo Inc said it may take “quite a bit of time” to weigh its strategic options, including keeping the company independent, following Microsoft Corp’s $45 billion offer to buy the company.

[From Yahoo says it needs time to mull Microsoft offer | Reuters]

Given the number of disappointed shareholders, including yours truly, Microsoft could very well succeed in a tender offer much like Oracle did with Peoplesoft. Institutional investors control 80% of the float on this stock and own 71% of the outstanding shares.

One very interesting thing to watch will be what the private equity guys do, but it’s hard to imagine raising this kind of debt in this kind of market so I’d be inclined to discount their status as a player here.