CME Wins Control of Dow Average in News Corp. Deal

"CME Group Inc. agreed to take control of News Corp.’s stock-index business, owner of the 114- year-old Dow Jones Industrial Average, to bolster revenue by licensing equity benchmarks.

News Corp. will contribute a unit that runs more than 130,000 stock indexes to a joint venture called CME Group Index Services, according to a statement today. CME will shift some of its market-data operations to the new business, and will own 90 percent of the combined company. The venture will issue about $613 million in debt, using the proceeds to pay $607.5 million to News Corp."

Michael Paley and Neil Hirshman advised CME.

This article appeared in the February 10, 2010 edition of Bloomberg News.