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Paddy Manning: author and journalist on the Murdoch family resolving media succession battle · Best of Business

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  Speaker 1: You're listening to a podcast from News Talk st B.
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  Speaker 1: Follow this and our Wide Ranger podcasts now on iHeartRadio.
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  Speaker 2: Now.
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  Speaker 3: After years of a legal battle, the Murdoch family has
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  Speaker 3: settled the succession question. Lachlan Murdoch is the winner. He
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  Speaker 3: will control his father's media group. The family have struck
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  Speaker 3: an agreement. Lachland controls a new trust. His siblings Preu, Elizabeth,
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  Speaker 3: and James will cease being beneficiaries of any trust with
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  Speaker 3: shares in FoxH or News Call, which means the conservative
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  Speaker 3: slant of Fox News, the Wall Street Journal, and The
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  Speaker 3: New York Post are guaranteed. Patty Manning has authored books
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  Speaker 3: and hosted a podcast on the Murdoch dynasty. Hi, Patty, Hi, Heather, Right,
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  Speaker 3: what do we know about the deal?
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  Speaker 2: It's an extraordinary deal, in fact, a three point three
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  Speaker 2: billion dollars us. The three disaffected siblings, James, Elizabeth, and
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  Speaker 2: Prue will walk away from the Murdoch media empire altogether
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  Speaker 2: and agree under a stand still commitment that they will
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  Speaker 2: not have any further involvement in either Fox or News corporation.
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  Speaker 2: And now I think that that is a that is
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  Speaker 2: definitely a final outcome to the succession question that swelled
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  Speaker 2: around the Murdoch family for almost three three decades as
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  Speaker 2: the witch of Rupert Murdock's children would get final, unassailable
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  Speaker 2: control of the business. Lachlan is the successor. But it's
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  Speaker 2: an interesting question how the deal is structured, and we're waiting.
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  Speaker 2: We haven't got full financial disclosure on this, but it
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  Speaker 2: seems that there is. Lachlan Murdock has decided to take
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  Speaker 2: a little bit of a risk that the combined Murdoch
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  Speaker 2: family holding. A lot of these shares are being sold
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  Speaker 2: to the public. So it's not the case that Lachlan
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  Speaker 2: is buying out his siblings. He's engineered to buy out,
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  Speaker 2: but it's not with his own money. Some of it
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  Speaker 2: is his money, but a good chunk of it is
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  Speaker 2: coming from the public buying this shareholding.
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  Speaker 3: It's interesting now this has been dragging on for such
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  Speaker 3: a long time. So what do you think it was
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  Speaker 3: in the end that managed to get them to let
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  Speaker 3: go of the company? Was it just the scale of
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  Speaker 3: the payout?
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  Speaker 2: I think that the price was part of the sticking
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  Speaker 2: you know, part of the sticking point in the negotiations
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  Speaker 2: was the price. And what what what that means is
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  Speaker 2: that there had been previous offers by There had been
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  Speaker 2: previous offers by local that to buy out his siblings,
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  Speaker 2: in particular, James, the most vocal critic of the box
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  Speaker 2: and news businesses, to buy out his you know, buy
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  Speaker 2: him out at fifty percent of the market value of
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  Speaker 2: the holding, for example, or and then it was increased
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  Speaker 2: to sixty percent. Now, what we've seen with this deal
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  Speaker 2: is that James, Liz and Prue have got eighty percent
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  Speaker 2: of the market value of their shareholding held in the
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  Speaker 2: Murdock Family Trust with this three point three billion dollar deal.
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  Speaker 2: And Lachlan, you know, I think will feel that that is,
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  Speaker 2: you know, that's a good outcome.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, Now, Patty obviously difficult to be running a media
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  Speaker 3: company in the twenty first century, right, things have changed
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  Speaker 3: quite a lot recently. Do you think Lachlan has got
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  Speaker 3: Is he going to change things up significantly?
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  Speaker 2: I don't think so. I think it's a status quo
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  Speaker 2: outcome for now. I think there are steps that he
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  Speaker 2: has previously signaled he would like to take, like putting
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  Speaker 2: Fox and News back together they were split in the
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  Speaker 2: wake of the fun Acting scandal. But I think he
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  Speaker 2: will want to he will want to recombine them, and
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  Speaker 2: he signaled that in the past, and it was scotch.
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  Speaker 2: That's the kind of deal he wanted to do, but
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  Speaker 2: it was scotch by opposition, partly from James as a
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  Speaker 2: beneficiary of the Murdoch family trust. And that's the kind
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  Speaker 2: of deal that he will be able to do now
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  Speaker 2: without any challenge.
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  Speaker 3: Patty, thank you for talking us through at Patty Manning,
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  Speaker 3: author of minibooks and podcast also host of a podcast
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  Speaker 3: on the Murdoch Dynasty.
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