November 3, 2009 - 4:00pm
Want more evidence print media is giving way to digital formats? According to CNBC “Squawk on the Street” Nov. 3, Internet behemoth Google (NASDAQ:GOOG ) could have its sights set on The New York Times (NYSE:NYT ).
Brian Shactman, a general assignment reporter for CNBC noted an article in the Nov. 2 Wall Street Journal that indicated a lot of big companies are hoarding cash and short term investments and it pointed out the information technology sector had nearly $280 billion to invest.
“There’s so much talk today about M and A,” Shactman said of mergers and acquisitions. “Well let’s look it forward – some names out there that could be in the offing, some things to think about. Remember The Wall Street Journal said yesterday tech has about $280 billion to work with. Remember Google said they wanted to make about one acquisition a month. They have the cash – they got to speed up.”
Shactman said S&P 400 companies, an index of companies with mid-cap stocks, could be targets of S&P 500, since many of those companies have this cash on hand.
“I talked to James Altucher of stockpickr.com today,” Shactman said. “He basically said the S&P 400 is going to get bought by the S&P 500 mainly because of a lot of issues with financing.”
According to the Journal, Google’s cash and short-term investments are up 53 percent to $22 billion in the third quarter from a year ago, accounting for 58 percent of its total assets. That puts Google in position to make a move on the Times and many targets.
“One name he said – New York Times – could be a target by Google,” Shactman said. “About.com is a big revenue driver for them. It’s trading at under $10. He said they should just throw in the towel – New York Times.”
Earlier this year, a share of New York Times had fallen under $4 a share. It’s rebounded since then, approaching nearly $11 a share in October, but has since settled just $8 a share.
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