Warner Music seen likely to raise bid for EMI

(Reuters) - EMI said on Monday it agreed to the offer from Terra Firma, possibly ending a seven-year standoff with smaller competitor Warner Music. Both firms feared regulators would kill any deal.




Warner Music, the fourth-largest music company, is evaluating its options after Terra Firma offered to pay 2.4 billion pounds or 265 pence a share in cash to buy No. 3 music group EMI, two sources close to the talks told Reuters.


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EMI agrees to Terra Firma offer

(Reuters) - The offer of 265 pence a share sent EMI's stock up to close 9.3 percent higher at 271 pence, indicating investors thought a higher counter bid was possible.




Sources familiar with the deal told Reuters that Terra Firma intended to keep EMI intact and proceed with plans to securitise the company's reliable music publishing assets.


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Karaoke-loving Guy Hands hears the music at EMI

(Reuters) - Hands made his name at Nomura in the mid-1990s, snapping up struggling companies in some of the biggest leveraged deals of the time before striking out on his own in 2002 with Terra Firma Capital Partners, with the Japanese bank as an investor.




By that measure, EMI, the world's third largest music seller, plays right into his turnaround expertise.


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PRESS DIGEST - New York Times - April 3

(Reuters) - * British music giant, EMI Group , broke ranks with the music industry's biggest corporations on Monday by announcing a deal to sell songs online through Apple Inc.'s music service without copy protection.

* U.S. and South Korean negotiators struck the world's largest bilateral free trade agreement on Monday, giving the United States a badly needed lift to its trade policy at home and South Korea a chance to reinvigorate its export economy.


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Warner Music shares up after analyst note

(Reuters) - Greenfield said shares in the company had fallen by more than 31 percent this year due to deteriorating music sales data and uncertainty surrounding a potential EMI merger and on Wednesday dropped below the $16 target price he had set for it.

Sales of CDs fell by 20 percent in the first quarter, according to data from Nielsen SoundScan.


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