Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway sees major upside from Scripps' $2.7 billion takeover of ION Media, CEO says
- Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway partly funded Scripps' $2.7 billion takeover of ION Media because it expects the merger to pay off handsomely, Scripps CEO Adam Symson said at a virtual UBS conference on Tuesday.
- "Think about why Berkshire is into this investment, it's because they see the same thing we do," Symson said. "Tremendous opportunity bringing these businesses together."
- Buffett's company has agreed to invest $600 million in Scripps in exchange for preferred stock paying an 8% annual dividend, plus a warrant to buy $300 million of the media group's common stock at a set price in the future.
- "Berkshire doesn't get into these transactions to make a modest coupon," Symson said.
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Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway helped finance Scripps' $2.7 billion takeover of ION Media because it expects significant upside from the merger, Scripps CEO Adam Symson said at a virtual UBS conference on Tuesday.
"Think about why Berkshire is into this investment, it's because they see the same thing we do," the media group's boss said, according to a transcript on Sentieo, a financial-research site. "Tremendous opportunity bringing these businesses together."
"Berkshire doesn't get into these transactions to make a modest coupon," Symson added. In other words, Buffett and his team wouldn't have funded the deal if they didn't expect it to create value and result in a substantial profit.
The famed investor's company agreed in September to hand $600 million to Scripps in exchange for preferred stock paying an 8% annual dividend. It also secured a warrant to purchase 23.1 million of the broadcaster's common shares for $13 each, which it can exercise up until a year after Scripps redeems all of the preferred shares at a 5% premium.
Whenever Scripps' stock price is above $13, Berkshire can use its warrant to buy the shares at a discounted cost of $300 million then sell them for a profit. Scripps has also agreed not to pay a dividend on its common shares or repurchase any stock until it buys back all of Berkshire's preferred shares, suggesting it will prioritize investing in its business, reducing leverage, and repaying Buffett.
"We'll be very, very focused on value creation through organic cash flow generation and paying down debt," Symson said, giving a target debt-to-equity ratio of 3.5 times.
The Scripps chief also confirmed that he roped in Buffett and his team to avoid taking overleveraging his company.
"We chose to bring Berkshire Hathaway in, because we wanted to make sure that our traditional debt ratio was really similar to what is an industry standard of around five times," he said.
Symson may well be right about Berkshire's hopes for its investment. Buffett demanded preferred stock and warrants as part of his investments in Goldman Sachs and General Electric, and scored tidy profits by cashing in the warrants after the companies' stock prices recovered.