Beamer

Remember that antitrust thing against Sky when the Competition Commission wanted them to sell down their stakes in ITV???? Well, after so much legal wheeling and dealing, they lost their appeal. Now they are required to sell down their 17.9% holdings in ITV.

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KrisyaKeno

Hmmmn... I am not sure if that is bad news for Sky or for ITV? I think it is worse for ITV, because of their financial condition now. They would have benefitted from more ownership with Sky than any other.

Jennifer_Amistad

I think it's Sky that is more on the losing end with this. Can you imagine, being forced to sell their stakes at a time that ITV stocks are really down??? I think they would have wanted to wait for a better time before unloading the shares. It sucks, now any party interested would use the pressure to sell to get ITV shares at rock bottom prices.

ManniPakyaw

How much do they have to sell?

vanreek

I'm just wondering why nobody raised a fussed when Sky was still buying the shares. Surely Sky would have made it public then that it was buying ITV shares?

vanreek

Well, to be compliant with the rules of the Competition Commission, their 17.9% share in ITV should be reduced down to 7.5%

BillieG

Ouch, that is more than 10%.

BillieG

Sky is in a bad position. They are in a pressure to sell the ITV shares which means that they can't demand the price they want for it.

cholesterol

Actually, the antitrust case stemmed from the 2006 purchase. A lot of Sky's rivals and some politicians raised hell when Sky bought the shares. You see, back then, the purchase was widely believed to have been made to block the merger of ITV and NTL, which we all know became Virgin Media later on.

cholesterol

Well, there are other courses of action right? Sky could very well just merge with ITV, just like ITV would have merged with the company that became Virgin Media.