Nearly three months after CNBC’s David Faber broke the news that Rupert Murdoch‘s News Corp. was making an offer to buy the Dow Jones Company, Faber reports this morning that it’s a done deal, and an “agreement is expected tonight.”
Apparently, enough members of the family which controls 64% of the voting shares, have agreed to sell. A little more than 3 months from now, Murdoch launches his business news companion to the #1 cable news network, the Fox Business Network.
Many analysts, and Murdoch himself, expect the Dow sale to be a game changer for FBN; bringing the heft of The Wall Street Journal to 24-hour TV. “We just want to have a business channel that lives up to the quality and traditions of The Wall Street Journal,” Murdoch told FNC’s Neil Cavuto on the day the offer was announced. “We think that we can do that and we will do very well.”
One hurdle: The Wall Street Journal has a television deal with CNBC until 2012. On that issue Murdoch said, “we think there is plenty of room for us all to work together.”