Dow Jones deal expected to face smooth review
WASHINGTON – If News Corp.’s proposed $5 billion purchase of Dow Jones & Co. succeeds, antitrust lawyers predict it would sail through regulatory review because Rupert Murdoch’s global media empire is not concentrated in any particular product or region.
The acquisition of the Wall Street Journal’s parent company could likely be approved in 30 days or less, the shortest review possible under antitrust law, says Robert Litan, a former Justice Department antitrust official who is now a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.
Among other holdings, News Corp. owns the Fox broadcast network, Fox News Channel, the Twentieth Century Fox movie and TV studio and has a one-third stake in satellite provider DirecTV. The company also owns the New York Post and the online social hangout site MySpace.
The sprawling nature of Murdoch’s holdings works to his advantage, several experts said, and certainly could be by design.
“It’s a sensible way of dealing with the regulatory restraints” that can impede cross-ownership of newspapers or television stations, said Richard Liebeskind, a former antitrust lawyer at the Federal Trade Commission who is now in private practice.
Murdoch’s company has extensive overseas holdings, including satellite broadcasters in Europe and Asia, newspapers in the United Kingdom and Australia and book publishing and magazine properties.
“The Bush administration has not been zealous in challenging mergers as it is,” Litan says.
“I just can’t see them going after this one.”
If Dow Jones owns a minor property that competes with a News Corp. holding, Murdoch likely would sell it to ease regulatory concerns, he added.
Murdoch wants the Journal and the global Dow Jones newswire enough to let go of other holdings if needed, according to several lawyers who spoke about the transaction on the condition of anonymity because News Corp. is a client of their firms.
The deal likely also would not face significant challenges from the Federal Communications Commission, lawyers said.