The more I think about it, the more I like this idea of a joint bid for Yahoo from Microsoft and News Corp. The bits of Yahoo which Microsoft doesn't want - call them "content", if you like - are precisely the bits which Murdoch would love. Meanwhile, as Sam Gustin points out, the Yahoo-AOL-Google rival approach seems to have a zero chance of passing regulatory muster.

The whole situation reminds me weirdly of the fight for ABN Amro. The deal that the target company wanted, with Barclays, never worked out, partly because Barclays stock was about as healthy as Time Warner's. In the end the bank got sold to a consortium of strategic bidders: an approach which managed to multiply synergies.

The biggest winners of all in that deal, of course, were ABN's shareholders, which means that anybody holding Yahoo on Wednesday night is waking up smiling on Thursday. It's still conceivable Yahoo will be sold for $31 a share; it's pretty much unthinkable at this point it will be sold for any less. And it might well now go for significantly more. Expect the risk-arbs to have a lot of fun today.