Cablevision has a new(ish) big stakeholder and things could get interesting as it is activist investor Harbinger Capital. According to a regulatory filing Harbinger now owns a combined 11 million shares in Cablevision through two funds as of June 30th, making it the 5th largest external stakeholder in the New York cable operator.

Harbinger, lest we forget, has been shoving around the media companies in which it has snapped up stakes to find to boost share prices, notably with New York Times and Media General earlier this year.

Harbinger will be joining Mario Gabelli (pictured left), of Gabelli & Co, which owns around 20 million Cablevision shares and has been very loudly pushing for the company to consider selling assets such as its cable networks. Gabelli wants Cablevision to use the funds from such an asset sale to buy back stock. Other big name Cablevision shareholders are ClearBridge Advisors (part of Legg Mason), T Rowe Price and London-based Marathon Asset Management.

Richard Greenfield of Pali Research, who brought the Harbinger filing to our attention, makes an interesting point that the top five stake holders now own 108 million of the total 295 million float. The Dolan family, who control the company, own around 72 million.

In Greenfield’s view:

This fact will help propel Cablevision shares if they begin to buy back shares in the fall.

We thought we had a big story on our hands this afternoon when an email popped up in our Inbox proclaiming: “Newsday TV”.

Finally, Cablevision Chief Executive Jim Dolan is sticking it to the Doubting Thomases of Wall Street by serving up the synergies between his recent acquisition, the Long Island newspaper Newsday and his 3-million strong subscriber base of cable TV customers and cable networks, we thought.

It wasn’t anywhere close to what we imagined.

Yes, Cablevision has launched a new interactive Newsday channel. But the interactivity pretty much ends with an on-screen subscription form letting cable customers order up a Newsday subscription on TV screens and charged to cable bills.

From the Cablevision release:

Located on Channel 611, the Newsday channel features both 7-day and weekend delivery options (Thursday, Friday and Sunday), and promotional information on the paper’s various sections and benefits, including local news, sports, Long Island Home, area coupons, the Explore LI feature section and classifieds. Also available through the channel are long-form videos of some recent Newsday stories, and information on the paper’s “Newsday Insider” benefit program for subscribers.

Meanwhile Wall Street cable analyst Craig Moffett of Bernstein Research not only thinks there’s little obvious strategic sense in the Newsday acquisition for Cablevision but that the Dolans, who control the cable operator, probably paid $150 million too much for the paper in May.

In his latest client note titled “Toys in the Attic…What’s Cablevision Really Worth?” Moffett says Cablevision is conservatively worth at least $45 a share compared with its current price of around $28.

In the breakdown of Cablevision’s assets Moffett values Newsday at just $505 million - a 20 percent discount in just three months.

No wonder top Cablevision stakeholder and activist investor Mario Gabelli wants improved corporate governance on big decisions and is calling for a sale of some of Cablevision’s asset’s to help boost the share price.

(Photo: Cablevision)

Is silver-haired media investor Mario Gabelli playing matchmaker?

In an interview, he says that it’s about time Cablevision get down to business and hook up with Time Warner Cable. Gabelli, who runs hedge fund Gamco Investors,  a top Cablevision shareholder, tells Bloomberg the family run cable operator and networks company should be “making love with Time Warner Cable.”

Gabelli’s proposal goes much further than the potential moves proposed by Cablevision CEO Jim Dolan. Not content with just a stock buyback or a dividend or even just spinning off some businesses, Gabelli suggests Cablevision should do nothing less than break up the company and hand over the cash to shareholders.

It’s no secret how Time Warner Cable has coveted Cablevision’s New York area cable systems. On more than several occasions over the past decade, Time Warner has held talks to varying degrees to snatch the systems.

From Bloomberg: “They have made a commitment to follow through,” said Gabelli, who two days ago called on Cablevision to sell Rainbow and use the money to buy back stock. “If they don’t, there are board seats available.”

We bet he’ll be pressing his case at a series of investors meetings the Dolans are planning to hold with top investors.

And how happy would he be if Jim Dolan came through this time?

Bloomberg: Breaking up the company would be “like hitting a grand slam home run in the bottom of the ninth inning of the seventh game of the World Series,” he said.

(Photo: Reuters)

We poked a little fun at Harbinger Capital Partners honcho Phil Falcone for not being the most communicative guy when it comes to dealing with some of the companies that his hedge fund is busy badgering. Let us therefore be the first to tell you when he actually does show up.

Falcone made an appearance at Mario Gabelli’s investor forum on Tuesday at the Harvard Club in New York, where Media General’s chief executive Marshall Morton and Harbinger Vice President Joseph Cleverdon laid out their competing visions for the newspaper publisher and broadcaster’s future.

Falcone sat in the second row and didn’t ask any questions, according to a well informed source. Later, Morton approached Falcone, but it wasn’t quite the SALT talks. Here’s Morton’s account:

“I went up to him, and said, ‘Are you Philip?’ And he said, yes he was.”

It’s a start.

Morton, meanwhile, had few good words for Harbinger’s presentation. You can read most of it here, but he also shared some of his other views with us:

On the presentation itself:

Their presentation was largely flawed. They used the slides to show us in a negative light, of course. … He had some facts in there that were disputable, as far as we’re concerned. … I will tell you my takeaway: We’ve tried for several months to talk to people, nearly nine months, so today we heard more … From that standpoint I feel like we’re better informed about what’s on their minds.

On whether there’s something they could work out:

It left us unable to do anything or draw any conclusions that would be usable. It’s not like we left there with solutions that were workable.

… Or maybe it’s not a start.

(Photo: Reuters file)