So finally, after much speculation, the new bid put forward by private equity Permira to take over HMV has been soundly rejected by company shareholders, saying even the new 210p/share bid “undervalued the company.” And since it seems awfully likely that Permira won’t come back with a new bid, what now? The Telegraph’s James Quinn isn’t terribly optimistic about HMV’s fortunes, saying that the company’s usiness model “is fundamentally flawed,” and that “it does not have the firepower to compete with Tesco and Asda on one hand, and Amazon and Play.com on the other.”
In other words, the stock prices are going to fall and the shares, Quinn concludes, “should not be chased.” And maybe, just maybe, HMV has blown their chances of getting saved.