Saudi King to buy Facebook for $150 billion to end the revolt: Goldman Sachs to advise

In what is being termed as pure Wall street Gordon Gecko tactics, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia has decided to make an offer of $150 billion to buy out Facebook. Inside sources within the kingdom suggest that he is very upset with Mark Zukerberg for allowing the revolt to get out of control. In a personal meeting between Mark Zuckerberg and King Abdullah on Jan 25, 2011, Zuckerberg had promised that he would not allow any revolt pages to be formed on Facebook even while he allowed Egypt and Libya revolt pages to be formed. But little did King Abdullah know Zuckerberg. Had he seen the movie “Social Network”, he would have been better advised than to trust Zuckerberg.

Left with no option, Abdullah advised by Goldman Sachs has decided to buy out Facebook and “clean out the weeds”. The offer on the table is $150 billion. Facebook balance sheet was shown to King Abdullah and his kingdom advisors had mentioned that it is not even worth $1 billion given that it generates no profit. But the King threw the report into the dustbin and fired his advisors and decided to hand over the investment banking mandate to Goldman Sachs who put the value at $150 billion. The deal will be all cash. It is worthwhile to remind our readers that Goldman Sachs had invested into Facebook at an unimaginable $50 billion valuation.



Social networking site Facebook has raised USD 500 million from Goldman Sachs and Russian Internet investment group Digital Sky Technologies in a deal valuing the company at USD 50 billion, says a media report.

“Facebook, the popular social networking site, has raised USD 500 million from Goldman Sachs and a Russian investor in a deal that values the company at USD 50 billion,” the New York Times reported citing a source.

The deal makes Facebook now worth more than companies like eBay, Yahoo and Time Warner.

Under the terms of the deal, Goldman has invested USD 450 million, and Digital Sky Technologies, which has already sunk about half a billion dollars into Facebook, invested USD 50 million, the report noted.



According Goldman report, the many advantages of buying out Facebook far outweighs the cost of the transaction. Goldman Sachs made a presentation to King Abdullah of how the facebook could be used to cement his position for ever. Never again will his kingdom see another revolt. The presentation also involved some Facebook pages of bikini clad models profile among other profiles. Sources reveal that King Abdullah had made up his mind immediately and spoke to Lloyd Blankfein to complete the transaction as soon as possible.

We are yet to hear back from Mark Zuckerberg on the offer though. But most analysts believe that Zuckerberg will not take the offer and will wait for King Abdullah to up the offer to at least $500billion. In the meanwhile king Abdullah has now logged on the Facebook and was buzy profiling some of the models in the Goldman Sachs presentation.

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