Yahoo CEO out amid furor over fake degree claim

Yahoo!’s CEO Scott Thompson has stepped down amid controversy over a fake computer science degree that he had on his biography. Thompson is the third CEO in three years to leave the Internet company struggling to define its future.
The departure is a victory for hedge fund manager Daniel Loeb of Third Point LLC, which is one of Yahoo's largest outside shareholders and brought the discrepancy in Thompson's educational background to light.
Yahoo said in a statement that its global media head, Ross Levinsohn, will be interim CEO, replacing Thompson who has left the company. It did not give a reason for his exit but said the board had settled a proxy battle with Third Point and will nominate three of its slate of four candidates to Yahoo's board.
Thompson's departure after just four months on the job throws into question the future of Yahoo as it struggles to revive growth amid fierce competition from the likes of Google Inc and Facebook Inc, and produce a long-term strategy to convince investors to reverse its share slide.
Yahoo had recently resumed negotiations to sell all or part of its more than 40 percent stake in Chinese Internet and e-commerce company Alibaba back to the Chinese company, after torpedoing a previous plan to do a complex tax-free transaction.
"Truly unreal. This company was struggling to find its path before any of this happened, and the situation will make them lost in the woods for that much longer," Macquarie Securities analyst Ben Schacter said. "It is not an overstatement to say that Yahoo has profound structural problems."
"The key question for shareholders remains how will they monetize the Asia assets. The board and shareholders, not an interim CEO, will need to figure it out," Schacter said.