About three days after plunking down more than $2 million to purchase Discovery Holding Co. class-B shares, media baron John Malone was at it again, buying 54,805 shares of the company for about $1.6 million.
Malone, the chairman of Liberty Media and DHC, bought the stock in several different transactions on Sept. 28, at prices ranging from $29.15 to $29.25 each, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing last Monday.
The purchases come on the heels of another recent SEC filing, when Malone revealed that he had purchased about 76,000 shares of DHC's Class B stock on the open market between Sept. 25 and Sept. 26 for a total of about $2 million.
After the earlier purchase, Pali Research media analyst wrote that it was “encouraging to see Malone buying stock at these levels, particularly as he sold some stock back on [May 16], albeit he appeared to reduce his holding in several of his publicly-controlled stocks in May 2007.”
Discovery Holding contains Liberty's 66.7% interest in Discovery Communications and its 100% interest in Ascent Media. Liberty spun off Discovery Holding in 2005.
Greenfield first revealed that Discovery Communications was in negotiations with Advance/Newhouse about possibly exchanging A/N's 33.3% interest in the group of networks for Discovery Holding stock in a research note Sept. 21. In that note Greenfield added that after a conversation with Malone, the Liberty chairman said that term sheets were being exchanged between the parties. Discovery confirmed Greenfield's report later that day.
