Cablevision submits $650 mil bid for Newsday

May 02, 2008 Cablevision Systems Corp. has made a $650 million bid for Tribune Co's Newsday newspaper, topping rival offers from media titans Rupert Murdoch and Mortimer Zuckerman, a source briefed on the matter said on Friday. The Cablevision offer includes a joint venture that would allow Tribune to keep a small stake in Newsday to avoid capital gains taxes, the source said. Real estate tycoon Sam Zell took Tribune private last year in an $8.2 billion buyout that restructured the publisher as an employee-owned company, saddling it with more than $10 billion of debt.

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