Acquisition almost complete

Article Excerpt

MICROSOFT CORP. $313 is a buy for aggressive investors. The company (Nasdaq symbol MSFT; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 7.4 billion; Market cap: $2.3 trillion; Price-to-sales ratio: 11.0; Dividend yield: 1.0%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.microsoft.com) has received preliminary approval from U.K. competition regulators for its acquisition of video game developer Activision Blizzard Inc. (Nasdaq symbol ATVI) for $75.0 billion (or $68.7 billion if you account for Activision’s cash balances). Its top game titles include World of Warcraft, Call of Duty, Diablo, Candy Crush and Overwatch. Regulators in most countries have already approved the deal. However, to secure U.K. approval, Microsoft agreed to sell the cloud streaming rights to Activision’s current and future games to French video game maker Ubisoft Entertainment. Ubisoft will pay an undisclosed upfront sum, plus future payments based on usage. The U.K. regulator should announce a final decision in October. Meantime, Microsoft is raising your quarterly dividend by 10.3%. Starting with the December 2023 payment, investors will receive $0.75 a share instead of…