Vivendi: getting messier

Whatever the spin, it wasn’t a win. Vivendi, the French telecom and media conglomerate, is trying to downplay the significance of a New York court verdict that found it guilty of misleading investors ten years ago. But as it looks ahead to what could be two years of further legal haggles, there might come a point where Vivendi will find it reasonable to settle out of court. So it has to answer a classic question: what is the price of uncertainty? The company says it is confident it will win on a...