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MUMBAI:
Rupert Murdoch's $5 million bid for The Wall Street Journal
is facing fresh opposition from some
of the Bancroft family members.
In the latest development, Jane MacElree, one of the senior
members of the Bancroft family who is said to represent about
15 per cent of the voting stock, has opposed the buyout.
MacElree
is of the opinion that selling the company would be tantamount
to compromising the Journal's editorial independence.
Her stance puts her against some of her seven children, who
are in favour of the deal.
After
the Bancroft family meeting on 23 July, this is the third
case of opposition to the buyout, after Christopher Bancroft
began canvassing hedge funds, private equity firms and General
Electric in an attempt to thwart the deal. His cousin Leslie
Hill has also begun seeking alternative bidders.
Advisers
have called on the Bancrofts to make a decision by early next
week, though some family members are resisting the idea of
a deadline.
The
company's advisers say that family-owned shares representing
30 per cent of Dow Jones's overall voting power must be voted
in favour of the News Corp transaction for it to go through.
The
family controls 64 per cent of Dow Jones's voting power. The
calculation assumes that non-family shareholders would overwhelmingly
back the deal.
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