Merger Rhetoric

  There is a wonderful article in today's Wall Street Journal of the rhetoric from CEOs on the announcement of a new large merger or acquisition.  The reporters took some of the most disasterous mergers of the last ten years and revisited the announcement language, full of spin and puffing.  The reporters made the point the that real reason for the mergers, such as a thorny CEO succession problem or a looming product disaster, are never revealed.  One wonders how, in a securities regime based full disclosure of all "material" information, we tolerate legally this "speechifying."