The party’s about over for the $5.8 billion Abbott (NYSE: ABT) acquisition of Alere Inc. (NYSE: ALR). Everything was bright and rosy when Abbott agreed to pay $56.00 per share for the point-of-care diagnostics and services company. Now, the $177 million termination fee Abbott faces to get out of the deal looks pretty cheap. In April, Abbott reportedly offered Alere $50 million to terminate the deal, but got no takers.

The trouble began almost immediately. The day of the announcement, February 1, Alere’s stock price shot up nearly 46%, to $54.11. But later that month,  it announced would delay filing its 2015 financial results with securities regulators due to revenue recognition problems in China and Africa.

In July, the company disclosed it would need to restate its annual financial statements for 2013, 2014 and 2015, as well as two interim reports from 2015. Shortly after that, the Justice Department began investigating Alere’s government billing practices, focused on its toxicology unit, regarding inducements to doctors to order its tests. Also in July, Alere voluntarily pulled its INRatio and its INRatio and INRatio2 PT/INR Monitoring System from the market, after the FDA disagreed that issues raised in December 2014 had been resolved.

In August, Alere filed suit in Delaware Chancery Court to force Abbott to continue the acquisition process. In October, its shareholders officially approved the takeover.

Needless to say, the company posted losses in the first three quarters of 2016, with third quarter revenue down 4%, to $582 million compared with the same period in 2015. Non-GAAP EBITDA was off 53%, and shares fell 12% on the news made public on November 4.

That day, Abbott sued Alere to obtain documentation and other information as stipulated under their merger agreement, specifically regarding the company’s business practices that are under U.S. criminal and civil investigations.

By December, Abbott had had enough, and filed suit to terminate the deal. According to a statement by company spokesman Scott Stoffel, “Alere is no longer the company Abbott agreed to buy 10 months ago. These numerous negative developments are unprecedented and are not isolated incidents brought on by chance. We have attempted to secure details and information to assess these issues for months, and Alere has blocked every attempt. This damage to Alere’s business can only be the result of a systemic failure of internal controls, which combined with the lack of transparency, led us to filing this complaint.”

Alere’s stock, as of this writing, is now trading at $38.00 and change. Even at that price, it doesn’t look like a bargain.