By Brooke Sutherland, Senior Reporter [@blsuth], Bloomberg Gadfly:
Sure, the back-and-forth rhetoric can turn, well, hostile and the risks of overpaying or wasting time and energy are high. And yes, oftentimes the deals don’t even happen, as occurred this week when Canadian Pacific Railway dropped its months-long (and unbidden) pursuit of Norfolk Southern. Be that as it may, some bad blood between deal partners can actually pay off. Purchases that start out unfriendly or turn hostile generate better returns for the acquirer, on average, than deals where the buyer and seller are in agreement the whole way through, according to an analysis by M&A research firm The Edge.