Yahoo’s Chief Development Officer Jumps Ship To Square

Jacqueline Reses, currently Yahoo’s chief development officer, is reportedly leaving Yahoo for Square. Reses’ main focus recently at Yahoo has been spinning off the firm’s stake in the Alibaba Group — a hold worth about $27 billion.

Seasoned and professional, Reses is both a major loss for Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer and a big pickup for Jack Dorsey’s executive team at Square, pre-IPO. She also could theoretically lessen Dorsey’s load, as he is pulling double duty as both Square and Twitter CEO.

Reses is one of many high-profile losses in the upper management team at Yahoo. In Mayer’s three-year tenure, Chief Marketing Officer Kathy Savitt left to join movie studio STX Entertainment; Head of North American Ad Sales Kevin Gentzel and SVP Mike Kerns also recently departed as well.

Moreover, Reses is exiting the firm at a tricky time, as Yahoo will be spinning off its stake in Alibaba — one of the main sources of the company’s stock value — by the end of the year. The board has authorized the spinoff, though the IRS has as of yet not granted an advanced ruling to bless the deal. According to Bloomberg, the agency is ratcheting up its scrutiny of such transactions and is unlikely to issue a retroactive decision.

Reses also enters Square at an interesting time, as Dorsey will be doing the pre-IPO roadshow for his payments company while simultaneously reorganizing and refocusing Twitter’s core services.

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