Disney deal set to value Fox at over $75 billion

NEW YORK: Walt Disney Co’s deal to buy film, television and international businesses from Rupert Murdoch’s Twenty-First Century Fox Inc will value the latter at over $40 per share, or $75 billion, a person familiar with the matter said. The deal, which is set to be announced on Thursday, will end more than half a century of expansion by Murdoch, 86, who turned a single Australian newspaper he inherited from his father at age 21 into one of the world’s most important global news and film conglomerates. Under the terms of the all-stock deal, Fox assets that will be sold to Disney, including the Twentieth Century Fox movie and TV studio, cable networks and international operations will be valued at around $29 per share, the source said on Wednesday. Fox’s remaining assets, focused on news and sports, will be offered to existing Fox shareholders in a new company likely to be valued at more than $11 per share, according to the source, who asked not to be identified ahead of an official announcement. Disney and Fox did not immediately respond to requests for comment.— Reuters