The Five Dumbest Things on Wall Street This Week

5. Acxiom Exodus

Acxiom (ACXM Quote) got the ax this week.

Private-equity firms Silver Lake and ValueAct Partners pulled the plug on their $2.25 billion purchase of Acxiom. Monday's decision ended ValueAct's two-year-long pursuit of the Little Rock, Ark., marketing company.

The firms agreed in May to pay $27.10 a share for Acxiom, after big shareholder ValueAct won a board seat by threatening a proxy fight. The dispute wasn't always pretty, with ValueAct saying back in October 2005 that it wanted to take control of Acxiom so it could "correct the 'fool's gold' strategy that current management has continued to pursue."

But Acxiom's weak earnings, combined with a tougher financing environment for leveraged buyouts, seem to have scared the buyers away. The private-equity firms agreed Monday to pay Acxiom $65 million to drop the deal -- far less than the $110 million fee the company was due under the original buyout pact. Shares plunged to a 52-week low below $15.

Silver Lake and ValueAct aren't the only ones walking away from Acxiom. So is the company's longtime leader, Charles Morgan. He had intended to stay on till the merger closed, but now he has decided he'll leave once the company finds a successor.

"Charles Morgan is an outstanding leader," lead director William Dillard said. "We are all very appreciative of his enormous contributions to the success of Acxiom."

Pity the poor sap who inherits this mess.

Dumb-o-Meter score: 72. "I had been considering stepping down as the leader of Acxiom and thought the completion of our going-private transaction would be the natural time to begin an orderly transition," Morgan said Monday. "As Acxiom will now remain public it is the right time for a change."

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