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Media
Appeals court upholds Competition Commission ruling on Sky’s ITV stake
By CMU Editorial | Published on Thursday 21 January 2010
BSkyB have again been ordered to sell their stake in ITV.
As previously reported, Sky bought a 17.9% stake in ITV in 2006. Virgin Media (NTL as it was) cried foulplay, because they were toying with proposing a merger with ITV at the time and claimed Sky bought the shares simply to scupper any such proposals.
UK media ownership rules did not stop Sky buying that sort of stake in Sky, but complaints were raised on competition grounds. The Competition Commission subsequently ruled against the share purchase, and in 2007 ordered Sky to reduce its stake in ITV to 7.5%. Sky have been appealing that ruling ever since, aware that selling any of their stake at this time will result in them making a considerable loss on their original investment.
But today the Court Of Appeal gave its backing to the Commission’s original ruling. Sky have a month to decide whether to take the matter to the UK Supreme Court.
