DealZone

The head of TMX Group said on Friday a hostile bid could come “any day now,” as a consortium of banks and pension funds prepares to take their approximately $3.7 billion offer for the Canadian exchange operator straight to its shareholders.

Live Nation Entertainment is in talks with its largest shareholder Liberty Media on taking the concert promoter and ticketing company private, the New York Post reported, citing sources familiar with the matter.

Nokia said it was still in talks with “multiple parties” about its stake in Nokia Siemens Networks, after a report that U.S. private equity firms had backed away from bidding for a majority stake.

Samsonite International, the world’s biggest luggage maker, raised $1.25 billion after pricing its Hong Kong IPO at the bottom of a revised price range as weak global markets sapped investor demand.

Japanese companies from eye shadow makers to insurers are stepping up the pace of their overseas expansion as the devastating March 11 earthquake provides another spur to escape their moribund domestic economy.

Nasdaq OMX and IntercontinentalExchange unveiled a rival bid to buy NYSE Euronext for about $11.3 billion in cash and stock, a 19 percent premium to the offer made by German competitor Deutsche Boerse. The move could raise new antitrust questions as it would combine the two largest U.S. stock exchanges. The new offer is valued at $42.50 per share, Nasdaq and IntercontinentalExchange said. The offer represents a 19 percent premium to NYSE’s closing price on Thursday and is 27 percent above the company’s valuation before Deutsche Boerse’s $10.2 billion bid in February. Analysts were skeptical about whether Deutsche Boerse would launch a counterbid.

Citigroup might be uncomfortable sitting on information needed to determine whether the onetime successor to Berkshire Hathaway Chairman Warren Buffett violated securities laws when he personally traded in shares of Lubrizol, which Berkshire acquired for $9 billion, but it doesn’t have to be damaging territory for Citi, writes Rob Cox.

No.1 concert promoter and ticketing company Live Nation Entertainment is in the running to buy the recorded music assets of Warner Music Group, the world’s third largest music company, according to a person familiar with the talks. Bids have come in valuing Warner Music Group at around $3 billion on an enterprise value basis, which includes both debt and equity.

Live Nation, Ticketmaster deal gets green light in UK

Britain’s Competition Commission did an about-face last night, giving its blessing to the proposed merger of live music giants Live Nation and Ticketmaster. What’s nearly as surprising as the reversal is the starkly negative reasoning behind the decision.

UK regulators had said in October they was concerned about the move to combine the world’s largest concert promoter with the leading ticketing group, saying fans could wind up paying more to see their favorite artists. Certainly artists, fans and politicians have been lined up against the deal, so the backbone to resist the merger seemed solid enough.

But on second thought, the Commission said the new entity would not have the incentive to hurt rivals, in particularly an existing partner of Live Nation’s. “We found that, in most of these cases, the merged entity would suffer significant and immediate losses, with very uncertain prospects for long-term gain … Therefore, we concluded that it was unlikely that the merged entity would harm other ticketing agencies, promoters and venues in these ways.”

Deal-making in the U.S. media and entertainment sectors is going to be down this year, says a new PricewaterhouseCoopers survey (request a copy here). Now, that's not a new or startling conclusion given the state of the economy, but it's just another piece of evidence that when consumers and advertisers get thrifty, deal makers can end up become benchwarmers as companies struggle with cost cuts and other exigencies.

Here are some industry trends for 2009 from the PWC survey:

Declining consumer spending is hitting many media and entertainment companies. What's more, these declines were exacerbated by technological convergence, as these firms adapt to and look for ways to make money off new Internet technologies. Overall U.S. advertising market is going to shrink as sponsors cut ad budgets across retail, consumer goods, automotive, financial and other sectors. Companies will continue to divest their non-core assets, but those that don't get a good price will prefer to hold on rather than sell at bargain prices. Bolt-on deals will likely be popular for risk-averse companies, so deals below $1 billion -- mostly small and mid-market companies -- will be a rising trend. Private equity will remain quiet since the debt markets aren't really healthy yet. Deal structures will change this year, given the difficulty of getting debt financing. The strategic rationale for doing a deal will be more important than getting a favorable capital structure.

But all hope is not lost, according to PWC's Transaction Services Entertainment & Media Leader Thomas Rooney:

With M&A activity ingrained in the DNA of so many companies and the ever growing presence of private equity, E&M deal activity might not be as quiet as many expect in 2009... History has shown the E&M industry to be one of the more active M&A sectors irrespective of market and economic conditions.

Ticketmaster and Live Nation are reported to have approved a merger plan, but regulators may yet steal the show. The Wall Street Journal reports Ticketmaster approved the deal on Sunday and Live Nation followed suit on Monday after resolving a handful of accounting issues, described as minor.

Ticketmaster dominates the seat-selling business and has a big artist-management division. Live Nation brings a big network of concert venues, promoters and a promotional prowess in everything from T-shirts to fan clubs.

Obama administration antitrust folks just sitting down at their desks will be taking a long hard look at this deal, which would create the world’s largest concert promoter with an estimated market value of $700 million. Obama has promised to toughen up antitrust enforcement, and the enfeebled music industry is likely to mewl foul.

Will Ticketmaster’s new duet fend off a hot rival and help it rise above an economic climate that makes pricey concert tickets seem like an extravagance?

The ticketing giant has announced a complex deal to acquire top artist-management agency Front Line, home to artists including Christina Aguilera, the Eagles and Neil Diamond. Front Line honcho Irving Azoff will run the combined company — raising questions about how Ms. Aguilera’s manager will negotiate her ticketing fees with himself.

Ticketmaster already owns a minority stake in Front Line, and will pay $123 million to Warner Music Group for an additional 30 percent stake, as the Wall Street Journal was the first to report.