AP source says Murdoch won't raise bid for Newsday
NEW YORK—Rupert Murdoch's News Corp., which had appeared close to a deal to buy Newsday, doesn't plan to raise its bid for the Long Island newspaper despite a higher offer from Cablevision Systems Corp., a person familiar with the matter said Friday.
Cablevision's offer of $650 million bested Murdoch's $580 million price, as well as an offer of equal value from New York Daily News owner Mortimer Zuckerman.
It wasn't clear whether Zuckerman would respond to Cablevision's higher offer, and a spokesman for him declined to comment.
Just last week Murdoch had been close to sealing a deal to acquire Newsday, but a person with knowledge of the talks said he didn't plan to raise his price. This person asked to remain anonymous since the discussions are confidential.
The competitive bidding for Newsday is good news for its owner Tribune Co., which took on an additional $8.2 billion in debt in December when it became a privately held company.
Tribune's new CEO Sam Zell had initially said he wanted to keep the company largely intact, but later decided to entertain offers for Newsday following a steep drop-off in advertising revenues at the company.
Like Newsday, Cablevision is also based on Long Island and has about 3 million cable TV customers in the New York region. It also has a local cable news channel, Madison Square Garden, and several cable networks including AMC and IFC.
News Corp. already owns the New York Post, The Wall Street Journal, and two New York-area television stations. The media conglomerate currently has a waiver to federal rules barring one company from owning both TV stations and a newspaper in the same market.
The Federal Communications Commission couldn't immediately block a purchase of Newsday. However, it could decline News Corp.'s applications to renew the broadcast licenses of those two New York stations, which are currently under review at the agency.
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