“Rupert Murdoch‘s 21st Century Fox said on Tuesday that it was withdrawing its $80 billion takeover offer for Time Warner, after being unable to convince its fellow media giant to begin merger talks,” Michael J. De La Merced reports for The New York Times.
“The withdrawal of the offer, only three weeks after making it public, is a rare deal-making defeat for Mr. Murdoch, especially after pursuing the biggest target of his decades-long career as one of the savviest of media moguls,” De La Merced reports. “In a statement, 21st Century Fox said that it still believed that a union of the two made sense. But Time Warner‘s firm rejection of its outreach and a drop in its own stock price made further pursuit of a bid untenable.”
“Instead, 21st Century Fox said that it would buy back $6 billion of its shares,” De La Merced reports. “In a separate statement, Time Warner reiterated that it believed it could succeed as an independent company.”
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