More M&A surge pieces

Wall St. Journal carried an informative piece recently on the surge (in total number of deals and the volume of the deals) in precious metals M&A. The gold/silver miners' merger activity should hopefully see a follow-through that involves more quality deals.

Bill Miller was quoted (in the WSJ) predicting a great 2005 with increased mergers and acquisitions being among the contributors. When Mr. Miller talks, you can bet that there is something worth listening to. This probably is now the most repeated line in the financial journals, but I have to restate it here - Bill Miller runs the only fund that has beaten the S&P for 13 consecutive years. Looks like it won't be 14 due to this year's lackluster performance of his fund, but an 11th hour miracle may be in the works, with Nextel seeing a runup due to Sprint buyout news and the slow recovery of Interactive Corp's stock. Wishing him good luck!