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Media News Last Week (1 - 7 May)
Monday
Sunnyvale Internet content powerhouse Yahoo (not wanting to be an also-ran in the growing online advertising market) said it will purchase Right Media, a New York online advertising exchange. Yahoo already owned 20 percent of Right Media, a stake that cost $40 million in October. The remaining 80 percent was much more expensive: $680 million in cash and Yahoo stock.
Yahoo’s move followed Mountain View Internet advertising juggernaut Google’s $3.1 billion deal to purchase online advertising agency DoubleClick, which is building its own Internet ad exchange.
Tuesday
Could the Wall Street Journal use a little Fox attitude? Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp., owner of properties such as the Fox News Channel and the New York Post, offered to buy Dow Jones, parent company of the Journal, for $5 billion, or $60 a share. That would be a huge gain for Dow Jones investors, whose shares were trading at about $36 before the bid was reported. But the prospects for the deal are uncertain: Dow Jones’ controlling shareholders are opposing the sale, at least so far.
Wednesday
Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs responded to critics who have been sour over the Cupertino company’s record on recycling and the use of toxic Advertisement chemicals in its products, including Mac computers and those wildly popular iPods.
Jobs said Apple would be greener (in an environmentally friendly way, that is) in the future. He detailed plans to remove or greatly reduce the amount of harmful chemicals (such as arsenic, mercury, brominated flame retardants and polyvinyl chloride plastics) in Apple’s products.
Speaking of Apple, its stock closed above $100 a share for the first time - mostly on investor optimism over its coming iPhone, the all-in-one mobile phone/iPod/pocket-size computer.
Thursday
Speaking of investor optimism, the Standard & Poor’s 500 index closed above 1,500 for the first time since the dot-com collapse. The blue-chip Dow Jones industrial average and the technology-laden Nasdaq composite index (a favorite in Silicon Valley) often get more attention. But the workhorse S&P 500 - which represents the largest public companies in the U.S. economy - gets more attention from professional investors. And many of us own mutual funds based on the S&P 500.
The Dow closed at yet another record high. The Nasdaq, though, is nowhere near its zenith: Back in the day, it traded above 5,000; lately, it’s been about half that.
Friday
Software mega-behemoth Microsoft (not wanting to be an also-ran in the growing online advertising market) is in talks to buy Yahoo, at least according to a report in the New York Post - which quoted unnamed Wall Street investment bankers who valued such a deal at $50 billion.
Many analysts were skeptical about the possibility of Microsoft owning Yahoo, pointing to problems in combining the companies’ cultures and possible antitrust issues. Even so, the speculation sent Yahoo shares up nearly 10 percent.
Media Shares Surge Read Here
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