TNT TNT’s defence

There’s nothing like a hostile bid to spur a company into action. But these days, the mere spectre of a takeover does the trick. TNT is buying back E1bn of shares and restructuring within a month of Cornelius Geber saying he might take the Dutch postal group private. TNT needed to do something dramatic. Until Geber came on the scene, its shares had underperformed the Amsterdam index by 9% over the last year. Financial results have been mixed, and an ongoing investigation into tax irregularities...