UPDATE: Despite Office Depot’s apparent squirrelliness about announcing its upcoming nuptials to OfficeMax, its intended isn’t being shy. Far from it — the company emailed all its reward cards holders today and trumpeted news of the union on its corporate site.

In a post about the merger, it writes in part:

As a combined company, OfficeMax and Office Depot will have the resources to provide a wide array of services and solutions to help you move your business ahead.

Until the transaction closes, OfficeMax and Office Depot will continue to compete as two separate companies. Nothing about our relationship or the way you do business with us will change before that time.

*Thanks for the tip, Aaron!

—————————-

This morning Office Depot was apparently feeling a bit confused as the company at first was all, “Hey guess what, everyone! We’re buying OfficeMax for $1.2 billion, hurray!” but then beat a hasty retreat and withdrew the announcement. It seems it shared that bit of good news prematurely and would like for everyone to just erase our memories. Oh, okay. Sure. But we all saw this coming anyway.

According to the Financial Times, the initial announcement revealed that Office Depot would take on OfficeMax in an all-stock deal, issuing 2.69 shares for each OfficeMax share with the smaller company valued at around $13.50 per share.

Several media outlets saw the announcement, which was part of a press release discussing Office Depot’s fourth-quarter earnings that originally was supposed to go out next week. It was taken back immediately but once you read something, you can’t unread it, am I right?

Neither company is commenting on it, as it could just be a draft that wasn’t ever supposed to see the light of day and all details within it could change.

But let’s just say it’s a pretty good indication that these two are going to get hitched eventually, even if the stress of planning the wedding is causing them to slip up a bit and do things they shouldn’t be doing yet. Perhaps an elopement is in order?

Once they do decide to really make this thing legit, the companies still have to pass muster with the Federal Trade Commission before they can complete a merger.

Office Depot to buy OfficeMax for $1.2bn [Financial Times]

Want more consumer news? Visit our parent organization, Consumer Reports, for the latest on scams, recalls, and other consumer issues.