"We are not currently in any discussions with Time Warner," said a release today from 21st Century Fox. "Currently" is the key word.
Nobody believes Rupert Murdoch (83) is going to simply walk away. The $60B mega-acquisition of Time Warner would be a fitting legacy to his long career.
The transaction also would provide Murdoch a solid lift from the scandal that rocked News Corp.
That sordid episode had Murdoch testifying and dodging a pie during a parliamentary inquiry into the hacking scandal and personally apologizing via a meeting with the father and mother of dead teenager Milly Dowler, who was at the center of hackergate.
The event caused News Corp. to shut down the News of the World tabloid, a further embarrassment.
Murdoch has already restructured his newspaper holdings (Wall Street Journal, New York Post, Times of London, The Sun and The Australian) into a revamped and independent News Corp.
His children are poised to slide into top management posts at both News Corp. and 21st Century Fox.
A Time Warner deal would give synergies and greater scale for 21st Century Fox as competition evolves to include Google, Comcast, AT&T, Verizon, Netflix, Apple, Microsoft in the mashed up media, entertainment, communications, technology world.
Wild card: Sumner Redstone, the 91-year-old controller of Viacom, who could emerge as a key ally of Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes.
Trump Media & Technology Group today reported a $58.2M net loss on $4.1M in 2023 revenues, a disclosure that drove its stock price down 22.6 percent to $47.96.
Barry Pollack, an attorney at Wall Street’s Harris St. Laurent & Wechsler, has registered Julian Assange as a client with the Justice Dept. “out of an abundance of caution.”
Paramount Global to slash 800 jobs in what chief executive Bob Bakish calls part of an effort to “return the company to earnings growth"... Rolling Stone editor-in-chief Noah Shachtman is exiting at the end of the month due to disagreements with chief executive Gus Wenner over the direction the magazine is taking... The New York Times broke the $1 billion barrier in annual revenue from digital subscriptions in 2023... Press Forward is investing more than $500 million to strengthen local newsrooms.
The majority of news articles are read within the first three days of publication, according to a recent report.
The Los Angeles Times gives pink slips to 115 people or 20 percent of its newsroom staff... TIME is also laying off about 30 employees, which is approximately 15 percent of its editorial staff... The Baltimore Banner, which was launched by Stewart Bainum in 2022 after he failed to buy the Baltimore Sun, added 500 subscribers per day in the three days following Sinclair Broadcast Group's deal to purchase the Sun.
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