UPDATED on Monday: It appears that both FT stories are now back to reciting the single $4 billion figure. Interesting. This item is entirely credited to the keen eyes of an anonymous commenter of mine, below.
In a new story -- identical to the old, in every respect, save one -- the Financial Times is now asserting that the Animal Health businesses may fetch upwards of $10 billion (up from $4 billion in the original rumor piece, of Friday night).
One increasingly obvious possibility -- to reach that number -- is a sale of everything (Both Merck's Merial share, and Schering-Plough's Intervet businesses):
. . . .Merck. . . is close to restructuring its lucrative animal medicines assets in a wide-ranging deal likely to be finalised in the next few weeks with its partner Sanofi-Aventis that could earn it more than$4$10 billion. . . .
To be fair, Merck CEO Dick Clark has made very specific statements to the contrary, and in very-recent SEC-filed documents, no less. So, until those are revised, updated or withdrawn, I'm not sure this is anything beyond a simple rumor.
But a rumor with a very high price tag.
