Sirius XM (SIRI) shares are flying high today, apparently on a new round of speculation about the long-term intentions for the 40% fully diluted stake in the company held by investor Liberty Media.
After the close yesterday, DirecTV (DTV) announced that it had reached a deal with Liberty’s controlling investor, John Malone, to swap his super-voting stake in DTV in exchange for a higher number of regular common shares. Malone is stepping down from the DTV board, as are two other Liberty nominees, including Liberty Media CEO Greg Maffei. The swap reduced Malone’s voting position in DTV to 3% from 24.3%.
That news comes after the blogosphere dug up a March 31 Federal Trade Commission filing that shows the FTC granted early termination of its review of some matter involving Liberty and Sirius; the theory among some Sirius bulls is that Liberty might boost its stake in the company to the maximum 49.9% allowed under the terms of the deal between Liberty and Sirius, although it seems more likely to be connected with Liberty’s participation in a Sirius debt offering announced in March.
I’ve got a call into Sirius to try to sort this out.
SIRI is up 6.8 cents, or 7.8%, to 93.7 cents.
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