Cable visionCablevision Systems Corp., owner of Newsday and local cable TV, which is selling to Netherlands-based Altice for $17.7 billion, had a “disappointing” Q4 said Zacks. Net debt is $7.43 billion.

Both the “top and bottom line” of Cablevision lagged the Zacks Consensus estimate. Net from operations was $33.8 million or 12 cents a share vs. $56.3M or 20 cents. Q4 adjusted net of 12 cents lagged the Zacks estimate of 16 cents.

Outstanding net debt was $7.43B as of Dec. 31, 2015. This gave the company $5.04B negative net equity.

Altice is headed by Israeli-French citizen Patrick Drahi, who is said to have a net worth of $15B by Wikipedia.

FCC approval is needed for the deal which is expected to close in the first half. Altice offered $34.90 in cash for shares of CSC on Sept. 17, 2015, a 22% premium to the share price. CSC revenues were $6.14B in 2015. Altice also takes over the debt of CSC.

NY Times article on Patrick DrahiClement Questions Purchase

Jaci Clement, executive director of Fair Media Council, Bethpage, which monitors media performance on Long Island, has expressed doubts about the purchase of Cablevision and Newsday by a foreign company.

She said Altice might spin off Newsday which she said is “exactly what Long Island needs most: a system of checks and balances within its media voices.”

Drahi has a reputation as a “ruthlessly efficient operator who runs a lean business,” wrote Andrew Ross Sorkin and Michael de la Merced in the Sept. 16 New York Times.

Media analyst Rich Greenfield of the Wall Street house BTIG told CNBC Sept. 17, 2015 that “Altice is known as an incredible cost cutter and there’s probably some fat in Cablevision.

The company, owned by the Dolan family which also controls the Madison Square Garden Co. and the Knicks and Rangers, resisted efforts to include Newsday, News 12 Networks and amNew York in the deal but Altice “insisted” on it, said the Sept. 16, 2015 NYT.

News12 Networks, including stations reaching Long Island, New Jersey, Westchester, Connecticut, Hudson Valley, Brooklyn and the Bronx, has an audience of 3.8 million. It is the “largest 24-hour TV news network in the nation.”

FMC was formed in 1979 to foster “media savvy consumers.”

Drahi was born in Casablanca to a Moroccan Jewish family and holds French and Israeli citizenships. Altice is the second largest telecom company in France with capitalization valued at $34 billion.