Today's M^3 - Nat Semi Best Performing S&P Stock Over Past 5 Months

With all the glum US equity news lately, we'll try to brighten things up by focusing on something positive. National Semiconductor (NSM) is up 71% since the end of January and is the best performer in the S&P over that time frame.



(Click on the image for a larger view. Click here for the current performance of stocks in the S&P 500)

There's a very good reason for the big gain - Texas Instruments announced it was acquiring NSM for $25 a share back in April. The total price of the deal was value at $6.5 billion, of which at least $3.5 billion will be funded by debt.

For TXN the market reaction towards the acquisition has been lukewarm; the stock is trading down about 3% since the acquisition was announced.