MarketWise Inc. MKTW shares plummeted more than 25% since its founder Porter Stansberry announced on X on Friday evening he was resigning from the company as its chairman and CEO.
As of Monday’s mid-day trading, MarketWise, a Baltimore-based investment research firm, has dropped 25.94% to 80 cents.
“It’s with sadness that I must announce my resignation from $MKTW,” he wrote on X on Friday at 7:25 p.m. ET.
“To everyone who bought shares because of my involvement in the firm, I sincerely apologize that I wasn’t able to complete my plans to turn around the company.”
In a lengthy letter that he published on X over several posts, he went on to say that he hopes MarketWise, which he founded in 1999, can find new leadership after a special committee unsuccessfully tried to negotiate the sale of Porter & Co., an investment research firm that he also founded in 2022, to MarketWise.
“I am resigning because after 10 months of negotiating for the sale of my company, Porter & Co., to MarketWise we have been unable to come to terms,” he wrote.
“As you know, once the board delegated its authority to acquire Porter & Co. to a special committee of independent directors, that special committee became bound to follow the legal direction of its outside counsel, lest the members of the special committee subject themselves to personal liability by closing the deal without counsel's endorsement.
“As result, I never had the opportunity to negotiate fairly with my partners. Instead, I was left trying to negotiate a ‘friendly transaction’ with what appear to be some of the fiercest litigators in the U.S. It was like trying to share a ham sandwich with a pit bull.”
Stansberry said he finds it “a mystery” that the committee could not work with its counsel to close the deal on agreeable terms in a timely manner, since an overwhelming majority of shareholders supported it and it is in the company’s best interests.
“After all, the opportunity to purchase for only $10 million up front (25% of the purchase price), a business with more than 25,000 customers that produced $28 million in billings in 2023, that boasted a $1,999 ARPU that year, and that is on track this year to grow its subscriber base by 30% — shouldn't have been a hard sell,” he wrote.
“In short, I was going to give you a great business, that would pay for itself. All you had to do was say yes.”
But the committee and the counsel were unable — or unwilling — to close the deal after signing a letter of intent on Nov. 3, he said.
“After spending more than half a million dollars on this deal (and after working for you for free for 10 months) I simply cannot continue this process. Regrettably, I must, and hereby do, resign as chairman and CEO of MarketWise.”
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