Monster Worldwide (MWW) announced financial results for the fourth quarter and the full year that were right in line with analysts’ expectations yesterday. What was unexpected was Monster’s announcement that it would buy HotJobs from Yahoo! (YHOO) for $225 million in cash.

Yahoo! paid $445 million in cash and stock for HotJobs in 2002. That would seem like a good deal for Monster, even though it eats up most of the company’s reported $275 million in cash as of December 31, 2009. Monster’s free cash flow was negative in 2009, but 2008 free cash flow topped $132 million. The figure for 2010 is likely to be somewhere in between.

Not everyone sees it that way, however. MWW shares are off nearly 20% in early trading today. Some analysts believe that the company overpaid for HotJobs and that high unemployment rates will depress Monster’s business at least through the first half of 2010, if not for the whole year.

Once the deal closes, Yahoo! will pay Monster between $20 million and $31 million a year to provide career and jobs content for the search company. The deal only includes North America, but Monster does have the right to negotiate with the international divisions of HotJobs.

According to Monster, it acquires access to HotJobs’ 12.6 million unique monthly visitors, only 20% of whom are duplicated in Monster’s own users. Monster also acquires more coverage in the healthcare, financial/insurance and retail sectors.

Monster also expands its network of newspaper partnerships by about 600 with the acquisition. That’s more than double its current partnerships, and it gives the company a presence in all 50 states.

The acquisition solidifies Monster’s position as the #2 player in the Internet career field, behind leader CareerBuilder, which is owned by a group including Gannett Co. Inc. (GCI), The McClatchy Company (MNI), The Tribune Company and Microsoft (MSFT). According to CareerBuilder’s website, it is visited by 23 million unique visitors every month.

In the short term, say the next 12-18 months, the naysayers are probably right about this acquisition. While unemployment remains high, there won’t be as many jobs posted online, and users are likely to stay away as well because they just don’t think that it’s worth their time.

But when the economy starts to pick up, and job growth begins again, Monster’s purchase of HotJobs may look like sheer genius.

Tell us what you think here.

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