Before calling on Dell Inc. to pay a special dividend to shareholders, Carl C. Icahn toyed with deploying another tool from his arsenal of tactics: a tender offer for the company’s shares.
In discussions with advisers to a special committee of Dell’s board some time in the last month, the activist investor floated the idea of offering to buy a big chunk of the company’s stock at about $15 a share, people briefed on the matter told DealBook on Thursday.
That would have left the computer maker as a publicly traded company, but with fewer publicly traded shares.
The offer that the special committee has accepted, which has garnered the opposition of Mr. Icahn and other sareholders, is worth $13.65 a share.
But Mr. Icahn appears to have pivoted to his current proposal, under which Dell would abandon its planned $24.4 billion sale to its founder and instead pay out a $9-a-share special dividend. That plan, outlined in a letter sent to the special board committee on Tuesday and known as a leveraged recapitalization, would value the company at about $22.81 a share.
(The billionaire could have stood to check his math in the letter before sending it, however. Adding up the breakdown of the dividend payment that he outlined â€" $4.26 a share from existing cash; $1.73 from borrowing against receivables; and $4.26 from new loans and bonds â€" yields $10.25, not $9.)
Mr. Icahn is continuing to hold discussions and meetings with advisers to Dell’s special committee, with one scheduled for Thursday, these people said.
The special committee has invited! the investor to participate in the go-shop process being run by Evercore Partners. People familiar with the thinking of its members say that the directors have urged Mr. Icahn to submit a proposal that they can consider, such as a tender offer, instead of a leveraged recapitalization.
Mr. Icahn didn’t return a call seeking comment.
