Is EchoStar A Takeover Target?

[John Corn]

Deutsche Bank upgraded satellite television concern EchoStar Communications (nasdaq: DISH - news - people ) to a "buy" rating from "hold." "We believe EchoStar's shares have greater than 10% upside, given the rising asset values for key content and distribution assets in media," the research firm said. Deutsche Bank also lifted its price target for the stock to $48 from $36. "Content and distribution media companies are clearly consolidating, perhaps down to just three to four major vertically integrated conglomerates," the research house said. "Echostar is the only remaining independent national video platform and with over 9 million subscribers is also the largest independent multi-channel provider."

http://www.forbes.com/markets/2004/02/12/0212automarketscan10.html?partner=yahoo&referrer=

 

[bluuz]

Buyout, merger, neither would surprise me. Echostar would fit nicely on the ladder of a number of media companies.

It's true that if you're stock starts shooting up it may because you have a bullseye painted on you, for sure.

 

[Cyclone]

Charlie is about to become a very wealthy man. Not that he's hurting now at what? 3 or 4 Billion dollars.

 

[jynx]

Charlie is about to become a very wealthy man. Not that he's hurting now at what? 3 or 4 Billion dollars.

I thought Charlie sold most of his stock last year. Is he still a major stockholder?
jynx

 

[Wdam33]

I remember reading here or over at DBSTalk that he sold some of his stock. I think it was the public stock kind...he still has quite a bit of class A stock or something.

 

[cdru]

Major shareholders in Echostar are:
Jim Defranco - 4,766,802 ~$185m
Charlie Ergen - 551,648 ~$21m
David Moskowitz - 473,249 ~$18m
Michael Kelly - 154,510 ~$6m
Michael Dugan - 127,367 ~$5m

DB also gave The SCO Group a target price of $45, so take things with a large grain of NaCl.

 

[dlsnyder]

Something smells like H2SO4...

 

[mike123abc]

Charlie has special class B stock that is not traded. Class A stock is traded and that is what the ownership numbers listed above show. Class B has 10 votes per share, class A has 1. Charlie has 238,435,208 shares of the class B. There are only 246,124,272 shares of the class A out. So, he outvotes class A by almost 10:1. Plus the class B can be converted to class A (1:1) any time he wants, so he owns about 50% of the equity also.

So, he has 90% of the vote and 50 times more stock than Jim has.