Tribune’s board was advised by a group of bankers from Citigroup and Merrill Lynch, which walked off with $35.8 million and $37 million, respectively. But those banks played both sides of the deal: they also lent Mr. Zell the money to buy the company. For that, they shared an additional $47 million pot of fees with several other banks, according to Thomson Reuters. And then there was Morgan Stanley, which wrote a “fairness opinion” blessing the deal, for which it was paid a $7.5 million fee (plus an additional $2.5 million advisory fee).
On top of that, a firm called the Valuation Research Corporation wrote a “solvency opinion” suggesting that Tribune could meet its debt covenants. Thomson Reuters, which tracks fees, estimates V.R.C. was paid $1 million for that opinion. V.R.C. was so enamored with its role that it put out a press release.
Unbelievable. Obviously no sector is immune from shoddy practices and insane financial contortions.
My crystal ball is at the state capitol protesting atheism by showing “It’s a Wonderful Life” on a loop, but some wags are predicting there is going to be a major US city without a daily newspaper in the near future.
Before anyone breaks out the champagne, they might want to consider all those people in suits and pantsuits who walk around city halls and state capitols hatching all sorts of schemes under less scrutiny now than they deserve. The idea of a major US city being “watch dogged” mostly by local television reporters should send shivers down the spine of any citizen. Not every crooked mayor is going to be carrying a puppy around.
I wish I could make millions by writing opinions like that, but I wouldn’t be a lawyer for very long if I did. Maybe we should license bankers.
And in related news, Zell is desperate to unload the Chicago Cubs from Tribune, but probably won’t be able to get as much money from the sale as he’d like, since MLB appears to be dead-set on keeping Mark Cuban (who bid US$1.3b for the club – the highest bid of all made) out of the MLB owners’ club.
HUH? I’ve lived in seattle for 20 years, boston for 11 years before that —
I got more REAL news outta the weeklies advertising all kinds of weirdo weirdness than I got outta the Boston Globe or Seattle Times –
those reporters either couldn’t tell you who was screwing who cuz they didn’t know, or
they wouldn’t tell you.
(oops! and, by the way, like OMG! I’ll tell you who was getting screwed — all us peee-ons working to stay afloat, while sweatheart deals are made with the bechtels and boeings!)
the faster they’re gone the sooner there will be opportunity for people to provide real news and get paid for it.
to hell with them. they have yet to get what they deserve for selling us out decade after decade.
rmm.
A few years ago, the Pee-eye and Times couldn’t even investigatively piece together that an inebriated WA state Supreme Court justice Bobbi “bumper cars” Bridges bouncing off of parked cars until arrested for DWI was actually coming from a party hosted by Liberal iconic mouthbreather Dave Ross. Despite everyone at KIRO radio knowing the truth, the story never hit the papers in this burgh.
Afterall, the P-I’s motto for years has been:
“all the news that fits out views”
@ 1~ You’re a lawyer like Nancy Pelosi is an intelligent leader, Roadkill. Dumbass
4 Oh, really??? Seems I read about that one first in the morning paper. They even managed to spell her name right.
I do seem to recall that a lot more recently, both local fishwraps pretty much looked the other way when Jean Hague got pulled over drunk as a skunk on I-90 and then used her….um, connections to get the whole thing swept under the rug. Of course, the KingCo Democratic leadership slept through that one, too. Otherwise Richard Pope might be on the County Council now.
What the daily newspapers blatantly ignored for as long as they could, here and just about all over the country, was the collapse of the housing market. When you make a major portion of your revenue from the the big Sunday real-estate ad section, the last thing you want to do is tell your readers they’d be bat-shit crazy to buy a house.
@ 5 ~ Even about coming from Davey Ross’ abode? I don’t think so…He plied her with alcohol and let her drive around Ballard running into parked cars until someone physically took them out of her hands.
Ross has never done a mea culpa.