The Telegraph Is Up For Sale Again: Here’s Who Might Buy It
The Telegraph, one of Britain’s oldest and most influential newspapers, is back on the block after UAE-backed investment group RedBird IMI officially walked away from its proposed takeover following a political furor.
(Bloomberg) -- The Telegraph, one of Britain’s oldest and most influential newspapers, is back on the block after UAE-backed investment group RedBird IMI officially walked away from its proposed takeover following a political furor.
RedBird IMI said Tuesday that it would sell on the rights to the Telegraph as well as the Spectator magazine, reigniting a media battle for control of two publications that are famously intertwined with the upper echelons of the Conservative party.
The Spectator is the world’s oldest weekly magazine still in print while the Daily Telegraph dates back to 1855 and claims the scoop for the outbreak of World War II.
The publications came into play last summer when Lloyds Banking Group Plc seized assets of the Barclay family, who owed £1.2 billion ($1.5 billion). The lender kicked off an auction but in December the Barclays repaid the debt with a loan from RedBird IMI — a joint venture between RedBird Capital Partners and UAE Deputy Prime Minister Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan’s IMI.
Former CNN chief Jeff Zucker planned to take over the Telegraph as part of the deal, but the move was scuppered by Tory politicians who feared there was a threat of a foreign state influencing a British newspaper.
Read More: UK’s Snub of Telegraph Bid Risks Souring Wider UAE Relationship
RedBird IMI has brought in New York-based investment bank Raine Group to help run a sale alongside London-based boutique Robey Warshaw.
Here are some of the likely bidders.
Jonathan Harmsworth
Daily Mail proprietor and Chairman Jonathan Harmsworth, also known as Lord Rothermere, is thought to be circling. Daily Mail & General Trust Plc bid for the Telegraph in 2004 and has explored approaches in recent years, according to people familiar with the matter. The Telegraph outsourced its print advertising to the group in 2021. For a deal to be approved by antitrust regulators, DMGT would likely have to argue its mid-market newspapers target a different audience to the Telegraph.
Daniel Kretinsky
Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky joined last year’s auction for the Telegraph before RedBird IMI pounced. Kretinsky, whose interests stretch from power plants to retail, is a minority shareholder in the French TV channel TF1, and also owns various magazines, including the French edition of Elle. In the UK, he owns stakes in grocer J Sainsbury Plc and Royal Mail owner International Distributions Services Plc, which recently rejected a full takeover bid from the entrepreneur.
Paul Marshall
Hedge fund manager Paul Marshall — a strong advocate of Brexit — has written polemics in the Telegraph and funded the opinion commentary website UnHerd, which occupies offices on the same Westminster street as the Spectator. He’s also backed right-wing TV startup GB News, whose initial founding chair was Spectator Chairman Andrew Neil.
The founding partner and chief investment officer of hedge fund Marshall Wace LLP has discussed with Citadel founder Ken Griffin the possibility of financial backing to take over the Telegraph Media Group, people familiar with the matter have said.
David Montgomery
National World Plc, run by media veteran David Montgomery, has called itself the “best qualified” bidder for the Telegraph in a statement after the UK government effectively blocked the RedBird IMI takeover.
National World — Montgomery’s latest listed vehicle — owns more than a hundred regional titles in the UK, including The Scotsman, Yorkshire Post and other British local newspapers. Montgomery, a former CEO of the Mirror Group, argued that the bid would be unaffected by competition issues.
Rupert Murdoch
News Corp.’s Rupert Murdoch has coveted the Spectator for decades, and has previously bid for it, Bloomberg reported last year. It would be trickier for Murdoch to acquire the much larger Telegraph Media Group, which overlaps in the premium segment of the conservative press with his British papers — the Times and Sunday Times — which he owns along with the Sun tabloid. If involved, the media tycoon is likely to remain focused solely on the Spectator.
More stories like this are available on bloomberg.com
©2024 Bloomberg L.P.
