Fairfax Media at 59% Discount Seen Ripe for Buyout Bid: Real M&A

For potential buyers still willing to bet on the newspaper business, no publisher is offering a cheaper entry than Australia’s Fairfax Media Ltd.

The owner of the Sydney Morning Herald and the Australian Financial Review trades at 0.3 times its book value, the lowest among media companies worldwide with market capitalizations exceeding $1 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Even after Australia’s richest woman, Gina Rinehart, raised her stake to 13 percent, Fairfax is still trading close to its least expensive versus net asset value on record.