Poor Pathmark. The company was lampooned by Gretchen Morgenson in last Sunday's Times. And now the company is at attempted target of the usual swarm of class action clowns. Why? Because instead of opting for a total buyout offer at $8.75 per share, management chose a 40% investment to accomplish more specific business improvement objectives. The company disclosed the buyout offer in a May 26th SEC filing, but supposedly that's not enough for some people.

Except there's a funny thing about this Pathmark episode. The stock price has remained perfectly steady at a little over $9.

Pathmark management made a business decision that the market was perfectly free to reject. It didn't want to sell the business outright. It just wanted some new cash to improve it. There isn't any law saying a company must sell a business once it gets an offer. A company must only get the best deal (and not necessarily just based on price) once it puts the company up for sale. This hasn't happened. I don't see why certain people are whining, except to be opportunistic.

You don't like Pathmark's decision? Sell your stock. Nobody forced anyone to invest in Pathmark.

The reality is that after all of this news has had time to settle, the stock price hasn't gone down an inch. It's always nice to see the wisdom of crowds win out once again.