I do have a few problems with it. First off, the market has declined significantly since Icahn invested in many of these companies. Since January 2007 (the midpoint of the listed involvements), the S&P 500 is down over %10. If a more appropriate proxy was used, Icahn’s relative performance wouldn’t look nearly as bad. Among the public companies listed are financial service firms, real estate developers, and highly levered firms. Now, considering today’s real estate market and credit crunch, can we attribute these stock prices to Icahn’s involvement? I don’t think so! Finally, as some one mentioned before, Carl deals with mismanaged troubled companies. In hard times, these companies are hit the worst and ultimately take years to be turned around.

Another problem is that the percentages listed do not take into account any distributions made to shareholders. These include regular dividends, some very significant special dividends and spin-offs. For example, Temple Island paid a special dividend of $12.36 (41% yield) on Dec. 31, 2007. Just taking this one dividend into account, shareholders are roughly even since the time of Icahn’s involvement.

Finally, the slide gives little credit to the opportunities Icahn’s involvement gave to shareholders. Carl’s $36 buyout offer for Lear is 60% higher than today’s share price. Similarly, WCI Communities shareholder’s could have garnered $22 a share for their stock. Its worth $1.26 today!

Yahoo has gone to a new low with this garbage!