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Murdoch makes US$5B bid for Dow Jones

(Reuters)
Updated: 2007-05-02 10:40

Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. (NYSE:NWS - news) offered to buy Wall Street Journal owner Dow Jones & Co. Inc. (NYSE:DJ - news) for about $5 billion, but a representative of the publisher's controlling shareholders said they would vote against the bid.

Murdoch, whose $60-a-share bid represents a 65 percent premium to Monday's closing price, would gain the powerful Wall Street Journal brand ahead of his planned fourth-quarter launch of a business news cable channel.

Dow Jones could provide the new Fox Business Channel with a steady stream of real-time news from Dow Jones Newswires, a growing Internet presence, and analysis from Wall Street Journal and Barron's reporters.

Rupert Murdoch, CEO of News Corporation, gestures during the the World Economic Forum in Davos January 26, 2007. News Corp. has made an estimated $5 billion bid to buy Dow Jones and Co. Inc. [Reuters]

News Corp., which made the offer a few days ahead of Dow Jones' April 18 annual shareholders meeting, called the proposal a "friendly" offer.

The takeover would make Murdoch a major player in global financial news. A deal would be controversial as Murdoch is known to intervene in the editorial process, leading to questions on whether the Wall Street Journal's news pages would keep their independence.

Dow Jones said it was informed by a representative of the Bancroft family, which holds 64.2 percent of voting power, that it would cast slightly more than 50 percent of the outstanding voting power against the proposal.

In a live interview on his own Fox News moments after Dow Jones' statement, Murdoch said his offer was generous.

"We were hearing last week first that (they) were running against us, then we heard that they decided to pursue it," he said on Fox News Channel's "Your World with Neil Cavuto." "Frankly, I don't even know if the whole family has been consulted yet. But there is plenty of time."

Murdoch added, Dow Jones "is a family newspaper. We are a family company." He said the vast resources of his company could also help boost the Wall Street Journal's circulation.