It should comfort Microsoft fans and/or shareholders to know that Liddell isn’t leaving in any sort of disgrace; CEO Steve Ballmer complimented him in a formal statement, and Liddell in fact seems to be interested in becoming a CEO himself.

Klein also said, "I’m honored to take on the role of Microsoft CFO.  I’ve learned a lot working with Chris, and I’m excited about the opportunities ahead for Microsoft.  We have an incredible pipeline of products, we have strong financial and operational accountability, and we are well-positioned for growth as the economy recovers."

So let’s now take a closer look at Klein.  With degrees from the University of Washington and Yale, he started at Microsoft in 2002, and served for a time as CFO of Microsoft’s Server and Tools Business.  At the moment, he’s CFO of Microsoft’s Business Division, which puts him in charge of an $18.9 billion organization and 7,800 full-time employees.

Klein’s not exactly from the minor leagues, then.  Count on the transition going smoothly.

Related Articles:

> Is The Murdoch Bing Deal Really Just About The Wall Street Journal?

> Report: Microsoft, News Corp. Plotting Against Google

> Microsoft Takes Users Behind Bing

The second sentence of the official release pretty well summed things up: "Operating income, net income and diluted earnings per share for the quarter were $3.99 billion, $3.05 billion and $0.34 per share, which represented declines of 30%, 29% and 26%, respectively, when compared with the prior year period."

All of those numbers came in under analysts’ estimates, too.

Then here’s the real doozy: while analysts wanted to see $14.4 billion in revenue, Microsoft reported $13.1 billion (which represented a year-over-year drop of 17 percent).

Chris Liddell, Microsoft’s CFO, tried to explain, "Our business continued to be negatively impacted by weakness in the global PC and server markets.  In light of that environment, it was an excellent achievement to deliver over $750 million of operational savings compared to the prior year quarter."

But, with no pun intended, it doesn’t look like investors are buying it.  Microsoft’s stock is down 7.86 percent in after hours trading.

 Chris Liddell

Much of what Liddell said during an earnings-related conference calls echoed Ballmer’s more ominous statements.  "Speed is of the essence for the deal to make sense," he began.  "Unfortunately, the transaction has been anything but speedy and has been characterized by what would appear to be unrealistic expectations of value."

Reuters reports that Liddell then continued, "We have yet to see tangible evidence that our bid substantially undervalues the company.  In fact, we see the opposite. . . .  [U]nless we make progress with Yahoo towards an agreement by this weekend, we will reconsider our alternatives. . . .  These alternatives clearly include taking an offer to Yahoo shareholders or to withdraw our proposal and focus on other opportunities."

It’s interesting that Microsoft still hasn’t settled on a single threat; the company’s leaders surely have some idea of what they’ll do within the next 24 hours.  Still, the main point here is that the leaders seem to be in agreement, despite what less powerful employees may think.

Also, if they hold to their "by this weekend" deadline, the next few days should be pretty interesting.

Microsoft said that it plans to pay $44.6 billion for Yahoo, half in stock and half in cash. The company has around $21.1 billion in cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities. Microsoft expects the deal to be completed by the second part of this year.

"It’s likely we’re actually going to borrow for the first time," said Liddell in an annual strategy meeting with analysts Reuters reported. "It’s going to be a mixture of the cash we have on hand plus debt."

Liddell would not say if Microsoft is currently purchasing yahoo stock on the open market. He did not provide any information on what form of debt Microsoft will turn to in the capital markets.

"Microsoft can probably get a lower price of debt than equity," said Kim Caughey, senior analyst at Fort Pitt Capital Group. "I’ve often wondered why Microsoft sits on the pile of cash. It doesn’t make a lot of financial sense."