TMP Worldwide Inc., owner of No. 1 online recruitment Web site www.monster.com, today said it would not sweeten its acquisition offer for HotJobs.com Inc., which gave TMP an ultimatum to match or beat an unsolicited bid from Yahoo Inc..
TMP would be entitled to a termination fee of $15 million and reimbursement of up to $2 million in other expenses if HotJobs spurns its offer in favor of the Yahoo bid, HotJobs said earlier this week.
On Monday, HotJobs, the No 2 online recruiting player, said it intended to accept an unsolicited bid from Yahoo unless TMP, which agreed to buy HotJobs in June, improved its offer.
Yahoo has offered to pay about $436 million in cash and stock for HotJobs. TMP's offer was initially valued at $460 million, but has declined considerably due to a drop in TMP's stock price.
Based on yesterday's closing prices, TMP's stock offer for HotJobs was valued at about $355 million.
TMP believes it has already offered HotJobs full and fair value for the company and that it would not be in the best interests of TMP shareholders to adjust its current offer, TMP said. Yahoo offered the equivalent of $10.50 per HotJobs share, half in cash and half in stock. At the time it was made, the deal represented a 62 percent premium to HotJobs stock, which soared the following day.
The combination of TMP and HotJobs would have brought together the two most formidable players in online recruitment, which together would have held more than 14 million resumes and 650,000 job listings.
The jobs listings business shows resilience in an economic recession, analysts have said, because people continue to look for employment when times go sour.
Online jobs listings also increase during hard times, and analysts estimated about $1 billion of the $10 billion jobs classified dollar is spent online.