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Prisa accepts Telefonica's EUR 725 mln offer for Digital+
2014-05-08 09:15:00| Telecompaper Headlines
(Telecompaper) Prisa's board of directors has accepted Telefonica's EUR 725 million offer for its stake in Spanish pay-TV platform Digital+. In a statement to Spain's market regulator CNMV, Prisa said that the companies now have 30 days to close the details of the agreement. The acquisition of Prisa's 56 percent stake in Digital+ will raise Telefonica's stake in the broadcaster to 78 percent. The remaining 22 percent is held by the Spanish unit of Italian broadcaster Mediaset. Digital+, which is also said to have interested companies such as Al Jazeera, News Corporation, Liberty Global and Vivendi, comes with a large customer base in the form of the 1.6 million subscribers to Spanish pay-TV channel Canal+. Highly-indebted Prisa is said to have initially sought well over EUR 1 billion for its stake, but Telefonica's final offer values the company at 45 percent less than four years ago, when it acquired 22 percent of Digital+ for EUR 500 million. Prisa's net loss more than doubled last year to EUR 648.7 million euros, prompting shareholders to approve an agreement in December to restructure around EUR 3 billion of debt to give it time to sell broadcasting assets and its Spanish-language book publishing divisions.
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Category:Telecommunications