The things other than their holdings (Alibaba, Yahoo Japan, cash) have a substantial negative net worth. Literally if they shut everything else down, or spun it off, their market cap would go up by $12bn.<p>This creates friction with investors. They&#x27;d like access to the value of those holdings without them being used to fund what they see as a losing wager. That&#x27;s why Yahoo in worth $12b less than the value of their assets.<p>By spinning off Yahoo, people who don&#x27;t think it to be a losing bet could invest in it. They think that with time they could turn it around into a sellable asset worth considerably more than if they sold it today. But investors currently don&#x27;t want to wait for that to happen because they don&#x27;t like the management team and think they&#x27;ll just hemorrhage money.