whitemail

English

Etymology

From white +‎ mail, by analogy with blackmail.

Noun

whitemail (uncountable)

1. (business) A tactic to resist hostile takeover, in which the target company sells discounted stock to a friendly third party.
   • 1991, Michael T. Jacobs, Short-term America: The Causes and Cures of Our Business Myopia‎^[1], →ISBN, page 92:

     Whitemail, which also appears unfair to some, may enhance shareholder value if the outside investor is able to influence management in a more positive way than other shareholders could.

2. Persuasion based on positive rather than negative effects.
   • 2000, Gore Vidal, The Golden Age‎^[2], →ISBN, page 432:

     Certainly FDR was a master of his own kind of whitemail and practiced it on the likes of Harry Hopkins.

Related terms

• see blackmail

See also

• whitemail on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Verb

whitemail (third-person singular simple present whitemails, present participle whitemailing, simple past and past participle whitemailed)

1. To persuade.
   • 2000 January 2, Howard Manly, “Tuning in Memories: Channel Surfing Comes With a Hefty Price Tag”, in Boston Globe‎^[3]:

     Major League Baseball whitemailed ESPN into paying a lot more, and the only thing we can be assured of is that the same old products and announcers will come in clearer in 2000 thanks to digital technology.

   • 2000, Gore Vidal, The Golden Age‎^[4], →ISBN, page 432:

     The ability to whitemail an emotional older man like my father into falling in love with him so that he would help him rise.

2. (ironic) Of a white person: to carry out blackmail.
   • 1973 January 1, “Avenging "Whitemail"”, in Time Magazine‎^[5], archived from the original on 14 December 2008:

     Sweating heavily under the hot lights, he started off with a diatribe against British policy toward Uganda, especially London's recent decision to cancel a $24 million aid program, which Amin dismissed as "whitemailing."