No Deals

Dealmaker John Malone doesn’t see much opportunity right now for acquisitions. "Certainly, a lot of stocks are cheap, but companies, at least companies in our space, aren’t necessarily for sale, based on their stock prices," he said at Liberty’s investor conference in NY. Basically, the credit crunch and economy makes it hard to form a long term strategy, he said. Pali‘s Rich Greenfield expounded on that in a note after talking to Malone during a break. He said Malone was surprised somewhat by Discovery‘s trading but noted that everything in media is weak now. The analyst reported that Malone doesn’t expect Discovery to pursue share repurchases given the current markets, nor does he see it going after Scripps given how far apart he believes their valuations would be. As for the always asked question of the possibility of a DISH – DirecTV deal, Malone was discouraging, saying he didn’t think it was worth either DS player’s time to approach the govt with a proposal. The Financial Times reports that Malone has begun talks about swapping his stake in Time Warner for AOL. "There have been limited discussions," Malone told the paper, adding that "Time Warner still needs to divide the business." AOL’s not expected to be separated until early next year [More at www.cablefaxcontentbusiness.com]www.cablefaxcontentbusiness.com].