Will Singo bring Ray Hadley back to 4BC?
Also: What one columnist isn’t writing. And: Let’s just get on with building the Games.
Is John Singleton about to do a Kerry Packer? By which I mean: will he buy back the media empire he sold a few years ago at a far cheaper price?
Packer famously sold the Nine Network to Perth businessman Alan Bond and then reacquired it at a steep discount when Bond went belly up.
Singleton was a shareholder in Macquarie Media, the company that owned a network of radio stations including 4BC, 4BH, 2GB, 3AW and 6PR, and sold them to Nine Entertainment in 2019.
He is now said to be “behind a consortium of media players hopeful of picking up Nine’s radio stations for a bargain basement price”.
News.com.au columnist Annette Sharp writes:
Word of a potential media comeback comes six years after Singleton, 83, sold his 32.2 per cent Macquarie Media radio network stakeholding to Nine Entertainment for $80 million in 2019…
Today industry experts have conservatively valued Nine Radio at between $25 million and $32 million, loose change for Singleton whose estimated worth has been put at $850 million.
At the time he sold his minority shareholding to Nine, Singleton refused to rule out a return to media investment in the future, telling The Australian: “I’m still very interested in media.”
Sharp adds that Ray Hadley, who quit Nine Radio’s 2GB last year with two years of his multi-million-dollar contract left to run, is “central to Singleton’s designs of rebuilding his media empire” and suggests Hadley might end up fulfilling his personal ambition of hosting a Breakfast show.
The report also suggests former Nine Entertainment CEO Mike Sneesby is somehow involved in the proposed Singleton bid.
With Nine apparently keen to shed its radio division, it’s clear some sort of deal will be done — be it with Singo, one of the other potential buyers already named, or somebody from left field.
I’ve written about this quite a lot lately — including here and here — and can only reiterate my hope that 4BC remains live and local, putting Brisbane audiences first. However, if the aim is to run the network cheaply (and that’s generally the way it is with old-media assets these days), that may not be the case.
Mocking us?
I noted the return of that old gossip-column standby, “Guess who don’t sue”, in a newspaper a few days ago. Here’s one for them:
Which newspaper columnist is trying to whip up outrage by writing about life’s struggles while their partner is posting pictures of their lavish lifestyle on social media?
And the decision is …
I may be reading this and other reports wrongly, but I assume the State Government already knows what the independent recommendation about the location of the stadium for the 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games will be — but we’re still going to have to wait until March 25 for the announcement.
If that’s the case, why don’t they announce it now and get on with doing whatever they have to do, with the least stress on the public purse as possible? Time is running out.
Disclaimer: Brett Debritz used to work for 4BC and Queensland Newspapers, among other professional adventures.