News says no to satellite bidding war

[John Corn]

SYDNEY, Feb 13 (Reuters) - Rupert Murdoch's News Corp Ltd said on Thursday it was still interested in acquiring a U.S. satellite distribution network, but would not be drawn into another bidding war.

"We continue to believe that having such a platform would be a great advantage to us in a rapidly consolidating world," News Corp president Peter Chernin told a phone briefing.

"But let me add this one caveat: We will not be drawn into a bidding war in order to acquire it. Having gone down this path before, we have a very clear sense of what we believe these businesses are worth."


Full Story (http://www.forbes.com/newswire/2003/02/12/rtr878341.html)

[Jacob S]

In other words, they dont want to pay more than what the company is worth seeing they would gain nothing in doing so.

[Cheyenne]

Or.... Maybe Rupert is tired of losing out to Echostar ?

[Mike123abc]

News corp knows what a money loser DirecTV is now. They know they cannot pay to much, they need to have a low enough price to be able to turn D* into a profitable business.... I.E. low debt load.

[Directv&TivoGuy]

Originally posted by Mike123abc
News corp knows what a money loser DirecTV is now. They know they cannot pay to much, they need to have a low enough price to be able to turn D* into a profitable business.... I.E. low debt load.

It's obvoius that you're a Dish Network prisoner. I feel so bad for you.

[Dennis]

Or maybe he is offering his opinion. He said nothing positive about E*. He simply said that murdoch would rather pay less than more.

[Mike123abc]

It is not a pro E* comment. It is just related to what is being reported, DirecTV has been losing a lot of money, if it were minting money the price would be a lot higher. Murdoch did not out bid E* the first time D* was for sale because he knows what price he can pay and still make money on the deal. Murdoch did not get rich by overpaying for assets.

It is a game right now, Murdoch is signaling he does not want to pay much money for it, and GM is saying they are reluctant sellers (i.e. we really don't want to sell unless someone were to just offer us too much to pass up). They will dance around a while until they either come up with a price they both can live with, the deal goes to someone else, or the deal does not go through.

Right now we have Murdoch saying he does not want to pay much, and he might be interested in E* instead.

GM is saying well maybe it is really not for sale, or maybe SBC is interested.

Here is the last 5 quarters of GMH: oldest to 12/31/02 before one time charges:
Q4/01 (155,900,000)
Q1/02 (180,500,000)
Q2/02 (177,900,000)
Q3/02 (13,600,000)
Q4/02 115,300,000 *note made this much when paid $600million breakup fee

After one time charges Q4/02 was (566,000,000), they got the fee from E* but had huge write downs on Latin American businesses. All in all they had reported losses of -$938 million dollars even with a $600 million payment from E*.

[Eyedox]

Good Riddance Rupert ... we don't want you f'***ing up our HD Satellite choices anyway!
PS: 480p sucks!