Stockholders of the corporation that owns BNSF Railway, North America's second-largest railroad, approved the $26 billion bid from Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway to buy the 77 percent of BNSF shares it does not already hold, the Journal of Commerce reported.
The expected approval came at a special shareholders meeting Thursday morning at BNSF headquarters in Fort Worth, Texas. It clears the way for Berkshire to rapidly close the deal and make BNSF one of its wholly owned units.
BNSF Chairman, President and CEO Matthew K. Rose said about 70 percent of non-Berkshire shares were voted in support of the merger.
Berkshire earlier said it and BNSF would plan to close the deal on Feb. 12.
That will make BNSF the only one of the major railroads that is not a standalone, publicly traded company that issues detailed quarterly financial and operating reports.
(The preceding report appeared on the Web site www.joc.com on February 11, 2010.)
Somewhere in all this "hip hip hooray" may be that golden meat cleaver the BNSF has been seeking to get out of all those "stupid" merger agreements granted to employees the last 30 years. I hope not for all you's still workin' for the outfit but I smell fish.
-- Edited by The Krink on Friday 12th of February 2010 03:00:13 AM
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If you are in a horror movie, you make bad decisions, its what you do.
