BCE bids anew for Astral

Article Excerpt

BCE INC. $41.99 (Toronto symbol BCE; Shares outstanding: 774.6 million; Market cap: $32.5 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; Dividend yield: 5.4%; www.bce.ca) recently failed to win regulatory approval for its $3.4- billion deal to buy Astral Media (Toronto symbols ACM.A and ACM.B). Montreal-based Astral owns 22 TV stations, 84 radio stations and several pay TV and specialty channels, such as the Movie Network, Family Channel and Teletoon. It also owns billboards and sells other outdoor advertising in Quebec, Ontario and B.C. Regulators felt the purchase would give BCE an overwhelming share of Canada’s Englishlanguage TV broadcast market, which would hurt competition. In a bid to satisfy regulators, BCE and Astral have now restructured their agreement. The companies did not reveal any details, but thenew deal probably gives BCE more flexibility to sell some of Astral’s English-language TV and radio stations. The company will probably hang on to Astral’s French-language operations because they will help it compete with larger broadcasters in Quebec. BCE is still…