The Justice Department and Federal Trade Commission have signaled they have no antitrust issues with Media General's purchase of stations from Sinclair.
Media General is buying Sinclair's KXRM and KXTU in Colorado Springs-Pueblo and Sinclair's WTTA in Tampa-St. Petersburg.
That came in an early termination notice from the FTC this week. That means that whichever is vetting the deal for Hart-Scott-Rodino antitrust issues (they divide them up, but Justice usually gets the station deals) found no reason to condition or block the sale.
Media General is merging with LIN, so the buyer of the Sinclair stations that got the FTC/DOJ is actually Mercury Holdings, a spin-off holding compnay to park the stations until the FCC approves the Media General/LIN deal, after which Mercury will be renamed Media General.
The early termination notice means the FCC is likely to give the Sinclair sales the go-ahead, since the FCC and Justice usually coordinate their reviews.
