Liberty Media is now the controlling shareholder of satellite radio provider SiriusXM by converting all of its Series B-1 preferred stock and purchasing an additional 50 million shares of common stock.
Having secured approval from both the Federal…
Liberty Media is now the controlling shareholder of satellite radio provider SiriusXM by converting all of its Series B-1 preferred stock and purchasing an additional 50 million shares of common stock.
Having secured approval from both the Federal Communications Commission and the Office of Engineering and Technology for the transfer of de jure control of SiriusXM in early January, Liberty moved quickly to consummate this by increasing its holding to approximately 50.21%.
On 17 January, Liberty paid US$ 157.8m for 50 million SiriusXM shares at US$3.1556 per share. The following day it converted all of its Series B-1 preferred stock into 1.29 billion shares of SiriusXM common stock. Together the transactions gave Liberty a total of approximately 3.293 billion shares in the satellite radio provider.
Liberty used cash on hand to fund its share purchase.
As Liberty has increased its control over SiriusXM, the board of directors of the latter has changed accordingly. With SiriusXM CEO Mel Karmazin due to leave the company at the beginning of February, three other directors have now announced their resignations.
Leon Black, Lawrence Gilberti, and Jack Shaw have all left the company with immediate effect. They will be replaced by three Liberty Media executives, Mark Carleton, Robin Pringle and Charles Tanabe.
Carleton is a senior vice president of Liberty Media, Pringle Liberty’s VP of corporate development and Tanabe the former executive vice president and general counsel of the company who retired at the end of 2012.
In addition, James Meyer, SiriusXM’s interim chief executive until a replacement for Karmazin is found, will join the board. Since 2004, Meyer served as the company’s president of operations and sales. Prior to that, he was president of Aegis Ventures, a consulting firm that provides general management services, having briefly served as special adviser to the chairman of Thomson S.A. at the beginning of 2002.
