Report: Murdoch Wins Dow Jones Bid

Looks like Rupert Murdoch has won his bid to buy Dow Jones:

The Bancroft family has accepted News Corporation's $5 billion (£2.46 billion) offer to buy Dow Jones, the owner of The Wall Street Journal, a Dow Jones executive said this afternoon, citing an internal company document.

John Prestbo, editor and executive director of Dow Jones Indexes, said that “the Bancroft family has accepted” the offer, Reuters reported.

Dow Jones “will be part of News Corp”, he added.

Mr Prestbo told Reuters that the information came from an internal company memo. [...]

The Times reported this morning that News Corp was last night thought to be likely to be able to secure sufficient votes from the Bancroft family to proceed with a formal offer for Dow Jones.

It is thought that a significant number of Bancroft family voting shares had still not been accounted for last night, even after their self-imposed 5pm deadline to vote in favour of a takeover had passed. Some family members were thought to be still haggling with their bankers and legal representatives.