Avi Arad resigns (kinda of)

[Elijya]

hmm (was on the front page yesterday but I missed it)


Arad Becomes Ex-Man at Marvel


In a move that reportedly caught Wall Street off guard, Avi Arad, whom many analysts have called the real superhero of Marvel Entertainment, resigned Wednesday as chairman and CEO of the company's film studio and chief creative officer of the parent company. He will now head his own company, Avi Arad Productions, which will continue to produce films featuring Marvel's superhero characters, including next year's Spider-Man 3. The move comes just days after X-Men: The Last Stand set a Memorial Day record at the box office and on the same day that Arad sold 3.15 million shares in Marvel Entertainment, worth $60 million, that vested last Friday. According to trade reports, some analysts speculated that Arad was leaving the company because he disagreed with its decision to fund several upcoming films on its own through a $525-million debt facility set up by Merrill Lynch. "This is not a ringing endorsement of company strategy," Banc of America analyst Michael Savner told Daily Variety. "He may understand something about the company the street doesn't," said Evan S. Wilson of Pacific Crest Securities in an interview with the New York Post.Marvel's shares tumbled by more than 5 percent on the news Wednesday.
http://imdb.com/news/sb/2006-06-01/

 

[Roughneck]

Woah....Thanks Lij

 

[R_Hythlodeus]

great!

 

[Joker]

great!

how is this great? before Arad, the highest quality Marvel movie we had was The Punisher starring Dolph Lundgrens balls.

 

[wolvie2020]

how is this great? before Arad, the highest quality Marvel movie we had was The Punisher starring Dolph Lundgrens balls.

Very true. Arad made great things happen in terms of Marvcel coming to the big screen. After he came on, Blade happened.

 

[iloveclones]

"This is not a ringing endorsement of company strategy," Banc of America analyst Michael Savner told Daily Variety. "He may understand something about the company the street doesn't," said Evan S. Wilson of Pacific Crest Securities in an interview with the New York Post.Marvel's shares tumbled by more than 5 percent on the news Wednesday.

I was going to post that in the Business thread, but never got around to it.

The funny thing is, I watch MarvelE stock every day (along with my 401K) just to see how they're doing. I was sort of expecting a bump, with the visible success of X3, and was surprised to see their relatively stable (recently) stock going down a bit.

I hope Marvel isn't extending themselves into a market (movies) that they don't understand. Movies are quirky, and fads come and go pretty fast. They already went through bankruptcy partially because they were sniffing after the trading-card/sticker market. Movies could be a black hole that could suck down a lot of their resources. Arad had a pretty good pulse for what Marvel characters could (and probably couldn't) do in the mass market. They should disregard his opinion with care.