Daily Mail Pulls Out Of Race For Telegraph Titles
Lord Rothermere’s Daily Mail & General Trust has pulled out of the race to take control of the Daily and Sunday Telegraph at the eleventh hour as bids for the titles approach the £700 million mark.
The media group admitted this morning that the price for the titles had now risen too high for it and bidding partner, venture capital firm CVC Capital Partners, which owns Debenhams and Kwik-Fit.
Lord Rothermere’s decision to withdraw from the race at the last minute leaves just two remaining bidders, reclusive media tycoons the Barclay brothers and a consortium led by the venture capital firm 3i.
DMGT had been a favourite to take control of the titles due to its ability to find cost cuts through synergy with its existing UK newspapers. However, there was also concern that it would face investigation by the competition authorities, given its ownership of the Daily Mail, the Mail on Sunday and the Evening Standard (see Race For Telegraph Titles Could End This Week).
CVC was to have taken a majority stake in its joint bid with DMGT, in an attempt to help the media group avoid any objections from media regulators, which could have taken up to six months to scrutinise the bid, with no certainty that it would get the go ahead (see Big Guns Could Be Ruled Out Of Race For Telegraph Titles).
However, Lord Rothermere said in a statement this morning: “CVC Capital Partners have been leading a consortium, including DMGT, which has been having discussions with Lazard relating to the sale of certain assets of Hollinger International. Those discussions have now terminated.”
Hollinger is expected to announce the Telegraph‘s new owner within the next few days. However, the bidding process may be delayed following an admission from the newspaper group that it had mistakenly overstated circulation figures for its Chicago Sun-Times title over several years.
Hollinger claims it is now trying to pinpoint what caused the errors and said that similar investigations at the Daily Telegraph and Sunday Telegraph had not revealed any erroneous circulation figures.
Telegraph Group: 020 7538 5000 www.telegraph.co.uk
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