Hey sluttake a look at the preamble DEAL NEWS. Only the titles that they see as big and important do they highlight.
Game on!
Drew
From: Publishers Lunch [mailto:lunch@publisherslunchdaily.com]
Sent: Friday, November 14, 2008 10:53 AM
To: contact@metlit.com
Subject: Publishers Lunch Deluxe
Friday, November 14, 2008
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Deal News
Among yesterday's 29 new deals: Allison Winn Scotch's latest novel, to Shaye Ayreheart Books; Sarah Silverman's humorous essays, to HarperCollins; how the hunt for natural gas is transforming small town America, for Random House; Barrett Brown takes on the gurus in HOT, FAT & CROWDED, for Cambridge House; a fashion and beauty guide from the WhoWhatWear.com founders, for Abrams; and still many more.
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Today's Meal
Redstone Has to Keep Reassuring Investors
Shares of CBS and Viacom have continued to fall recently as investors remain concerned that Sumner Redstone will be forced to sell some of his shares in order to refinance his $1.6 billion in debt. In a self-fulfilling spiral, the market worries that "further weakness would undermine Mr. Redstone's talks with lenders and force him to sell stock in the two companies he controls." The WSJ adds: "Redstone is expected to have to sell some assets to get bankers to agree to a restructuring. Advisers are combing through the family's holdings to assess their value and ease of sale, according to people familiar with the situation. But the two sides are exploring a longer timetable to sell any assets in an effort to avoid fire-sale valuations, the people said."
Redstone said once again in a statement that his holdings exceed his debts and he has no plans to sell shares in either CBS or Viacom. Despite a big rally yesterday, CBS shares have fallen another 21 percent this weekend. Yesterday the board approved the continuation of their 27 cent per share dividend (which represents an annualized yield of close to 17 percent.)
WSJ
Quercus Raising More Capital; Cheetham Steps Down
Shut out of traditional credit markets, Quercus is planning to raise 1.75 million pounds "in additional working capital and to strengthen its balance sheet," nearly all of which will come from Pentland Group, which currently holds almost 20 percent of the company's stock. Shareholders must approve a waiver from the takeover code, however, to allow Pentland to increase their stake to more than 30 percent. The thinly-traded company currently has a market cap of 3.1 million pounds, with the stock having fallen over 71 percent in a year.
The immediate need is to refinance 775,000 pounds in loans that have been used to fund the publisher's development during "prevailing economic and stock market conditions" and the directors "believe that the loans are no longer a viable source of ongoing funding."
The company says they plan to continue to acquire and grow aggressively. They note that "approximately £650,000 of the funds raised will be used for advances to authors and to expand the company's list of contracts," while another 200,000 pounds will go "to strengthen the publishing teams and the foreign rights team."
Additionally, executive chairman (and holder of over 9 percent of the stock) Anthony Cheetham will become non-executive chairman immediately, which he calls "a natural progression to ensure a stable transition into the next stage of the group's development."
Proposal
More UK Credit Insurance Worries
Credit insurance seems to be a more standard feature of doing business in the UK than it is in the US, and the FT reports on growing concerns that "the drying up of credit insurance could herald a wave of insolvencies in the troubled sector with the weakest stores and suppliers driven out of business."
Entrepreneur Luke Johnson, whose company owns Borders UK, says: "This is a lubricant that is vital for everyday transactions. I think if necessary the government should step in to replace the capacity collapse."
An anonymous executive adds: "If credit insurance gets pulled it can be more serious than bank debt having to be renegotiated because working capital is something that a lot of businesses regarded as being for free. If credit insurers say they are no longer going to cover suppliers, you've got three months of cash flow to find and that is very destabilising."
That process can be seen at Woolworth's wholesaling subsidiary EUK (whose customers include ASDA and Borders UK). As the paper reported yesterday, "EUK would normally give wholesale customers weeks to settle bills. But in a step that underlines fears over Woolworths' creditworthiness, some of its own suppliers have begun to demand that it pay them cash immediately. This has forced EUK to insist some of its customers also pay cash in advance."
FT
NY Considers Library Funding Cuts
One more story on the economy: New York's budget division has recommended to the governor a $20 million cut in library support as part of proposed statewide reductions of expenses. That represents about 20 percent of the currently allocated $99 million, a number already slimmed by $4 million from the 2007 allocation. The NY Library Association says the proposal "would bring library aid down to a level not seen since 1993." Executive director Michael Borges says in a statement that "no other educational institutions have been targeted for a 20 percent cut in state funding. There seems to be no recognition by state budget makers that library usage has skyrocketed over the last year as more people turn to libraries for finding jobs, improving their literacy skills and for free reading materials and programs for their families."
NYLA
RDR Appeals Rowling Ruling
Facing a fine of just $6,750 and free legal defense, why wouldn't they? Michigan's RDR Books
filed a notice of appeal last week against Judge Robert Patterson's September ruling in favor of Warner Bros., blocking publication of RDR's HARRY POTTER LEXICON.
Grand Rapids Press
On Kitty on Oprah
December's Chicago Magazine will carry a story called Bagging the Media Queen, looking at Kitty Kelley's research and forthcoming book on Oprah Winfrey. The Sun-Times says the article "makes it pretty clear Kelley's long-anticipated book about the TV queen will not be a puff piece. Kelley told all of the people she's interviewed that her Oprah project will not be a hatchet job.... Yet the Chicago mag story points out that even after spending a hour or two listening to glowing tales about Oprah, Kelley eventually gets around to questions about sex, drugs and old boyfriends."
Sun-Times
How to Keep Cooking Everything
Mark Bittman's HOW TO COOK EVERYTHING has sold over 2 million copies in 10 years and now Wiley is releasing an announced 300,000-copy printing of a substantially revised edition. The author tells the WSJ, "there is a lot less meat in this edition. We made a decision to increase recipes for vegetables, fruit, beans, grains and salads. The balance has shifted. I looked at the old edition and thought, 200 chicken recipes, who needs that?"
WSJ
People
Namrata Tripathi will join Atheneum Children's as executive editor on December 8. She has most recently been senior editor at Hyperion Children's.
Additionally, associate editor Lisa Cheng will move from Margaret K. McElderry Books to Atheneum, reporting to Tripathi.
2008 Man Asian Winner
Filipino author Miguel Syjuco has won the Man Asian Literary Prize for ILUSTRADO, a about "a young Filipino caught within a notorious scandal spanning over the Philippine history." The judges said it "seems to us to possess formal ambition, linguistic inventiveness and sociopolitical insight in the most satisfying measure. Brilliantly conceived, and stylishly executed, it covers a large and tumultuous historical period with seemingly effortless skill. It is also ceaselessly entertaining, frequently raunchy, and effervescent with humor."
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