This week, in both America and Europe, corporate bosses locked horns as the biggest hostile bids in years twisted and turned their way towards a denouement. Even in gentlemanly corporate Japan, where hostile bids are a rarity, at least two big companies are fighting off the unwanted attentions of outsiders. The boom in mergers and acquisitions in the late 1990s was notable for agreed deals between CEOS who made them as sweet as possible for themselves. Is the boom that many forecast for this year going to be equally notable for long contested corporate tussles? And, if so, who is going to benefit the most this time? So accustomed are investors to the idea that companies overpay for acquisitions that news of a takeover bid almost invariably sends the target company's share price soaring. Comcast's hostile bid for The Walt Disney Company on February nth pushed up the moviemaker's share price to $28, well above Comcast's initial offer. Comcast has been busily trying to persuade investors that it is not interested in paying current market prices for Disney. Yet who can blame them for hoping? On February 17th, Cingular, an American wireless telecoms company, agreed to buy AT&T Wireless, a weaker rival, for $41 billion in cash, about twice the price that the market was putting on the intermittently profitable firm just over a month ago.
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机译：本周，在美国和欧洲，由于多年来最大的敌意竞标发生扭曲，企业老板锁定了号角，并转向了结帐。即使在敌意收购很少的绅士公司日本中，至少有两家大公司正在与外界的不必要关注打交道。在1990年代后期，并购的热潮以CEOS之间达成的协议交易而著称，这使它们对自己越好。对于长期争论不休的公司争端，许多人预测今年的繁荣是否会同样显着？而且，如果是这样，谁这次将受益最大？投资者已经习惯了公司为收购支付高价的想法，以至于收购要约的消息几乎总是使目标公司的股价飞涨。康卡斯特（Comcast）在2月n日对沃尔特迪斯尼公司（Walt Disney Company）的敌意收购使该电影制片人的股价上涨至28美元，远高于康卡斯特（Comcast）的最初报价。康卡斯特一直在努力说服投资者，它对支付迪士尼当前的市场价格不感兴趣。谁能指责他们的希望呢？ 2月17日，美国无线电信公司Cingular同意以410亿美元现金收购实力较弱的竞争对手AT＆T Wireless，大约是一个月前市场对这家间歇性盈利公司的价格的两倍。
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