An SEC 13G filing dated February 11, 2002 for Homestore indicates that an investment company has purchased a large number of shares of Homestore stock. The filing included a seemingly innocuous reference to "HotJobs.Com, Ltd".

Yahoo! also announced the completion of its purchase of Hotjobs.com February 11th. These events fueled investor speculation that Yahoo! has backdoored its way into owning a sizeable interest in Homestore.

Spokespersons for Yahoo! explain that "neither Hotjobs.com nor Yahoo! own shares of Homestore."

The 13G filing was made on behalf of Capital Research and Management Company and signed by James P. Ryan as Attorney-in-fact for Paul G. Haaga, Jr., Executive Vice President of Capital Research and Management Company. The closing paragraph of the filing is as follows:

          Signed pursuant to a Power of Attorney dated January 9, 2002

          included as an Exhibit to Schedule 13G filed with the

          Securities and Exchange Commission by Capital Research and

          Management Company on January 10, 2002 with respect to

          HotJobs.Com, Ltd

This led some investors to incorrectly infer that HotJobs was somehow the actual owner of the Homestore stock referenced in the filing.

According to the Yahoo! spokespersons, the confusion may stem from the fact that Capital Research owns stock in Yahoo!, HotJobs, and Homestore.

"They are an investment management company," explained the spokespersons. "They have independently decided to buy stock in Homestore."

"A 13G is required by the SEC when a company owns more than five percent stake," continued the spokesperson. "They are required to file a 13G to restate their positions in those companies."

"In the HotJobs filing, they listed a number of people who had been granted power of attorney, and what Capital Research did to save themselves some effort is in their 13G for Homestore, they reference people who had power of attorney for Homestore as the same as for HotJobs."

Is that an irregularity? "No, it's not an irregularity. It meant that Capital Research used the same people listed as power of attorney. So it is a very straightforward documentation," said the spokesperson.

Editor's Note: This article has been corrected. The original version run on February 12, 2002 might have appeared to imply that there is evidence that Yahoo! owns a large block of Homestore stock despite Yahoo's statement to the contrary. Realty Times knows of no reason to believe that Yahoo! owns any Homestore stock.

Published: February 20, 2002

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