08/25/2011

Bloomberg Enters Agreement to Acquire BNA

Bloomberg and BNA issued the following press release today:  

BNA and Bloomberg

Bloomberg Enters Agreement to Acquire BNA

Combination Propels Bloomberg's Expansion into Legal Information Market and Enhances BNA through Bloomberg’s Data and Technology Expertise

Acquisition Increases Bloomberg’s Presence in Washington Market

 

NEW YORK and ARLINGTON, Va. - Bloomberg and BNA today announced that they have entered into an agreement for Bloomberg to acquire all of the outstanding shares of BNA for $39.50 per share in a cash tender offer followed by a merger for a total purchase price of approximately $990 million.  The transaction is expected to close in 2011. 

 

BNA, which is wholly owned by current and former employees, provides important legal, tax and regulatory research and analysis and would become a stand-alone subsidiary of Bloomberg. 

 

Together, Bloomberg and BNA would form a unique combination of premium content, deep subject matter expertise, proprietary data and world class technological capabilities to provide distinctive products and solutions for professionals and decision makers in law, government, business and finance.

 

This acquisition would immediately strengthen Bloomberg’s offerings in the legal information market by complementing Bloomberg Law -- the only legal research system that fully integrates primary research, dockets, company information and proprietary news -- with BNA’s trusted legal, tax and regulatory content.  

 

In addition, the combination would enhance Bloomberg’s coverage and analysis of tax and accounting, labor and employment, healthcare, intellectual property, and telecommunications issues.  

The acquisition would significantly grow Bloomberg’s presence in the Washington, DC area through its multiple operating units, Bloomberg News, Bloomberg Government, Bloomberg Law and BNA -- which would work together to provide unparalleled coverage and analysis of U.S. policy and regulatory issues for customers.    

 

"BNA’s employees have built a superior franchise and we are enthusiastic about a Bloomberg-BNA combination that will deliver more premium content to our professional audiences,” said Dan Doctoroff, CEO and President of Bloomberg.  “BNA research and analysis will make Bloomberg’s products even more valuable, and BNA would benefit from our data and technology expertise.”

 

“For more than eight decades, we have provided our subscribers with quality products that allow them to do their jobs more effectively and efficiently,” said Paul N. Wojcik, Chairman and CEO of BNA. “We believe this is the start of a new day, where we will join forces with Bloomberg to extend our premium content to an expanded audience.”

 

“Bloomberg and BNA share many of the same values, including a commitment to deliver high-quality content to customers, employing highly skilled and experienced workers and offering superior customer service,” said Peter Grauer, Chairman of Bloomberg.  “We look forward to welcoming them to the Bloomberg family.”

 

The tender offer is expected to commence by September 8, 2011.  The acquisition is subject to the terms and conditions set forth in the merger agreement, including a condition that at least a majority of the outstanding BNA Class A Shares are tendered, that the waiting period under the U.S. Hart-Rodino Antitrust Improvements Act of 1976, as amended, has expired or been terminated and other customary conditions.  If the tender offer is completed, untendered shares of BNA are expected to be converted in the subsequent merger into the right to receive the same US$39.50 per share price paid in the tender offer.

 

You can read the complete press release here: Download Press Release 

 

For more information on Bloomberg acquisition of BNA:  Download Q&A

 

Rick Powell is Bloomberg's Chief Communications Officer

08/23/2011

Touchdown for Bloomberg Sports

Player match up You're probably asking, "Bloomberg Sports, really?"

Yes, really.

Bloomberg Sports uses the power of Bloomberg's data and analytics and applies them to the sports world.  Let's face it; we know how competitive fantasy football leagues can be. So we do all the calculations to help sports fans pick their starting lineups each week. We look at all the key factors that impact performance including the weather, competition, team support, and recent stats. We also offer a unique technology-driven Risk/Reward Index, analyzing consistency of the scrutinized players and pointing to long shot opportunities for players whose performance tends to be most unpredictable.

We've worked with Major League Baseball since 2009, and this is our second year with the National Football League. Today, we launched Decision Maker 2011 for football with new features we worked in during the off-season.  First, users can now see a player's potential based on a projection for the entire season.  Also, there's now a crowd polling tool so users can vote on the most compelling weekly match-ups and see the aggregated results of all Decision Maker users.  You can check it out here.

I'm excited to say that we'll be working with two fantasy aces as spokespeople for Decision Maker 2011: Jacksonville Jaguars running back Maurice Jones-Drew, who has a show on Sirius/XM Runnin' with MJD and WFAN sports radio personality Anita Marks, who is part of the NY Giants broadcast team and also hosts fantasy football shows on Sirius/XM. They'll highlight analytic features of the tool and provide tips.

Stay tuned for insights from them and us throughout the season. Get ready. It's going to be a great one!

 

Bill Squadron, Head of Bloomberg Sports

08/22/2011

Bloomberg Uncovers the Fed's Secret Liquidity Lifelines

Three years and 29,000 pages of Fed documents later, Bloomberg uncovered the who, what, when and a lot more in its investigation of the 21,000 loans to banks totaling as much as $1.2 trillion in public money.

I'll start by saying that Bloomberg was built on the core principle of transparency - fast access to information that could increase capital flow and economic growth. We also believe that the public has a right to know. (For a timeline of Bloomberg's lawsuit against the Fed, see below.)

You can check out our news stories, starting with how Morgan Stanley led banks tapping into fed money, on our Fed Loan Disclosure topic page. (They'll be more to come over the next couple of days.) And, of course, in the spirit of transparency, we've built an interactive data visualization that allows you to view all the numbers so you can answer questions like: What was the largest amount of money any one institution borrowed? Who took advantage of the programs for the longest amount of time? Which foreign institutions received funds?

 The visualization also lets you dive deep into each institution's history with the lending programs, or compare the borrowing habits of multiple institutions with each other. The data can be displayed and sorted based on a number of variables such as peak amount borrowed, average balances, location, or industry. One of the most noteworthy features is being able to look at what company executives were saying when the value of the loans were astronomical. Hypo Real Estate Holding AG, a German commercial property lender, is a good example. Look at what they said when they were borrowing about $21 million per employee.

 

Hypo chart 

 Timeline of Bloomberg's lawsuit against the Fed

 

- May 21, 2008:  Bloomberg files a Freedom of Information Act request. The Fed denies this request

-  Nov. 7, 2008:  Bloomberg files suit to require disclosure [Bloomberg LP v. Federal Reserve, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan)].

-  Aug. 24, 2009:  Judge Loretta Preska rules that the Fed must disclose this information

-  Sept. 30, 2009: Fed appeals decision

-  Jan. 12, 2010: U.S. Court of Appeals hears oral arguments

-  March 19, 2010: Appeals court upholds Preska decision

 -  May 4, 2010: Fed and Clearing House ask full U.S. Court of Appeals to overturn Preska ruling

-  Aug. 23, 2010: Full appeals panel refuses to overturn Preska ruling

-  Aug. 27, 2010: Court of Appeals gives Federal Reserve 60 days to decide on taking the case to the Supreme Court

-  Oct. 26, 2010: Federal Reserve decides not to join the Clearing House Association in asking the Supreme Court to consider an appeal.

-  Feb. 19, 2011: U.S. Solicitor General recommends the Supreme Court reject the Clearing House's appeal.

-  March 21, 2011: Supreme Court rejects appeal and orders release of bank loan data

 

 

Meghan Womack, communications for Bloomberg News

08/12/2011

A Record-Breaking Week

What a week. The S&P 500 had the biggest slump since November 2008. U.S. stocks tumbled. The Dow Jones Industrial Average, NASDAQ Composite, and Russell 2000 - - all tumultuous.

This point in time is certainly disconcerting for people, especially business and financial professionals. Since Bloomberg has many lenses into the moving markets through our data, news, and analytic tools, we wanted to take this opportunity to share with you some of what we are seeing.

The recent market turmoil broke historic highs for market data activity globally, according to Bloomberg’s Research & Development team. Bloomberg processed 43.7 billion ticks on August 10, 2011 (a tick is an upward or downward movement in a security's trades, bids, and offers prices; tick data provides all market activity, not only volume of shares traded, giving investors full market transparency to make more informed trading decisions). This is 46 percent higher than previous days, including peaks in volatility experienced during the Japanese earthquake, the flash crash, and the apex of the financial crisis.

Market ticks 4 
Market tick volume reaches historic highs

Bloomberg.com had some of its biggest traffic days ever, with more than 60 percent increases over average daily unique visitors and page views. The live TV player on Bloomberg.com had nearly three times the amount of unique visitors than what we see on average per day. And, we were the first in reporting the announcement of S&P's downgrade of the U.S.'s credit rating on the Bloomberg Professional service.   
 

Home page shot 8.10.11 

Most read stories on Bloomberg.com:

-    U.S. Stocks Fall as S&P 500 Has Biggest Slump Since November 2008

-    S&P Seen Surrendering to Tea Party Costing U.S. Taxpayer

-    Stocks Tumble Most Since 2008 as Treasuries, Gold Surge on S&P Rating Cut

 

Most watched videos on Bloomberg.com:

-   Buffet says 'bet heavily' against double recession

-   Marc Faber says markets 'extremely oversold'

Jim Rogers on U.S. Rating downgrade, global markets

Whether you subscribe to the Bloomberg Professional service, watch our TV station, listen to our radio programs, or visit our web site, we'll continue to keep you informed on the issues that matter most during this concerning time.

 

The Bloomberg Team




08/11/2011

Bloomberg Launches Community-Supported Agriculture Program for Its New York Employees

Bgreen is local Bloomberg is taking an active role in supporting the health of its employees while also supporting local farmers.

Bloomberg recently teamed up with Mountainview Farm in Easthampton, Massachusetts to bring the first-ever Community-Supported Agriculture (CSA) program to the New York office. Participating employees receive a weekly share of fresh produce during the farming season, as well as exposure to new vegetables and ways to prepare them.

This mutually beneficial program not only supports the local economy, but also gives employees access to better quality produce that is grown without chemicals and pesticides.

Bgreen is local 2 Additionally, CSA's provide farmers with the advantage of getting paid early for their crop, not having to lose profits to a “middle man,” and the opportunity of getting to know their customers. Consumers have the benefit of knowing exactly where their food comes from, learning how their food is grown, and getting produce that is grown sustainably.

More information on Bloomberg's sustainability initiatives can be found here.

 

 

Angela Martin leads communications for Bloomberg Sustainability

08/02/2011

Bloomberg Businessweek to Launch New Editions in Europe and Asia

Bw 8.1 coverBloomberg Businessweek is launching two new editions--in Europe and in Asia--in early 2012 and raising its rate base from 900,000 to 980,000.

For those who don't know, a magazine's rate base is the average circulation that it guarantees its advertisers, so an increase in the rate base is an important indicator of consistent and strong growth.

The European and Asian editions of Bloomberg Businessweek will feature content from the global edition of the magazine combined with regional reporting from more than 800 Bloomberg reporters in Europe and 500 in Asia. This follows revitalized local-language editions in Chinese, Thai, Indonesian, Turkish, Arabic, and a new Polish-language edition will launch later this year.

For more background on the news, here's the press release.

 

 

 

 

Heather Carpenter co- leads communications for Bloomberg Businessweek

07/29/2011

Bloomberg View Launches New Blog "The Ticker"

 

The ticker 4 
 
 

Bloomberg View, the opinion section of Bloomberg News, is expanding its web presence with its own blog, "The Ticker."  

The Ticker will appear during the week and will feature commentary from Bloomberg View's editors and columnists. It will focus on -- but not be limited to -- economics, politics, finance and the markets.

View currently publishes three other blogs: Echoes, which looks at economic history, World View, which taps into the discussion taking place in India, China, Russia, Brazil and the Middle East, and Business Class, which features commentary from the Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago.

While the View will work to bring the world's discussion to Bloomberg, it will also work to bring Bloomberg to the world. The edited posts will frequently draw on the data, analytics, and reporting produced by the extended Bloomberg organization.

 

The initial group writing for the Ticker will include:

  • George Anders, member of the Bloomberg View editorial board, focusing on technology and economics. He lives in California and is the author of the upcoming book, The Rare Find: Spotting Exceptional Talent Before Everyone Else.

 

  • Caroline Baum, Bloomberg View columnist, covering the bond market and other financial issues and is the author of "Just What I Said."

 

  • Max Berley, member of the Bloomberg View editorial board, focusing on European and American political economy.

 

  • William D. Cohan, Bloomberg View columnist and the author of "Money and Power: How Goldman Sachs Came to Rule the World."

 

  • Paula Dwyer, member of the Bloomberg View editorial board, focusing on the political economy and regulation, and is the co-author of "Take on the Street."

 

  • James Greiff, member of the Bloomberg View editorial board, focusing on markets and finance.

 

  • Tobin Harshaw, member of the Bloomberg View editorial board, writing a daily e-mail, Share the View, highlighting the section's upcoming content. To subscribe, contact him at tharshaw2@bloomberg.com.

 

  • Simon Johnson, Bloomberg View columnist, writing about economics, and previously was chief economist of the International Monetary Fund.

 

  • Michael Kinsley, member of the Bloomberg View editorial board. He previously was the editorial page editor of the Los Angeles Times and the editor of the New Republic, Harper's and Slate.

 

  • Timothy Lavin, member of the Bloomberg View editorial board, focusing on politics and policy.

 

  • William Pesek, Bloomberg View columnist based in Tokyo, writing on Asian economic and political issues.

 

  • Jonathan Weil, Bloomberg View columnist, covering the financial industry.

 

  • Mark Whitehouse, member of the Bloomberg View editorial board, focusing on global economics and finance.

 

  • Francis Wilkinson, member of the Bloomberg View editorial board focusing on national, state and local politics in the U.S.

 



Ty Trippet leads communications for Bloomberg News and Media Group

07/21/2011

Bloomberg Launches Cloud Archiving For Microsoft Office 365

Cloud computing image Bloomberg's electronic communications compliance offering, Bloomberg Vault, has integrated with Microsoft Office 365. That means financial services firms using Microsoft Office 365 now have a cloud-based solution for meeting global electronic communications regulatory and risk management guidelines.

According to a study commissioned by Bloomberg Vault and Forrester Consulting in May 2011, financial institutions are taking more precautions when it comes to archiving emails. They are rapidly moving to hosted email compliance and storage services in order to deal with increasing costs, risks, and regulations.

And, it's not just financial institutions that worry about information management regulations and prudent records retention processes. Companies in all industries need to think about this as well. (The combined service from Bloomberg and Microsoft can also aid non- financial organizations.)

 

Here's the net-net on the benefits from Bloomberg Vault/Office 365:

- Integrated and secure archiving of all electronic communications as a hosted service, helping companies to reduce overhead costs by leveraging the cloud;

- Specialized features designed to help financial firms meet compliance requirements through real-time policy management, advanced search, eDiscovery and electronic records retention and preservation;

- Biometric security for compliance officers to enhance access controls.

 

Harald Collet is the global product manager for Bloomberg Vault

 

07/14/2011

Bloomberg Testifies at Senate Hearing on Proposed Regulations for Derivatives Trading

Ben macdonald 4 Bloomberg testified before the U.S. Senate Banking Subcommittee on Securities, Insurance and Investment regarding regulations on over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives on June 29th.

As the largest independent trading platform for OTC derivatives, we provided perspectives on provisions of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform & Consumer Protection Act, which requires companies to trade credit-default swaps (CDS) and other derivatives products through regulated exchanges called swap execution facilities -- or SEFs.  Given our unique position in the marketplace as a wholly independent player, the Senate Banking Committee asked us to comment on how SEFs should be regulated.

In short, we support the mandatory clearing and post-trading reporting requirements, but have concerns about the way the regulations will be promulgated, as poorly constructed rules have the potential to inhibit market trading flexibility and raise costs for the end user -- which would not fully achieve the important goals set out by the Dodd-Frank legislation.

As with all new regulations, the devil is in the details. As stated in our testimony before the Senate, sophisticated market participants do not really need or want federal regulators micromanaging execution protocols. 

Bloomberg intends to register as a SEF and we are actively engaged with regulators in the rule making process.  Our customer base is evenly distributed amongst buy side and the sell side participants, so we are an independent company not beholden to anyone, nor are we biased toward any particular element of the market.  As an empirically-driven and data-centered member of the financial services community, our goal is to bring transparency and efficiency to the marketplace -- including in the highly complex derivatives market.

To read the Bloomberg testimony, click here, or if you prefer to watch the full Senate hearing, you can do so here.

 

Ben Macdonald is Bloomberg's Global Head of Fixed Income

07/12/2011

Dan Doctoroff Named CEO of Bloomberg LP

D_doctoroff-approved 2 One of the hallmarks of Bloomberg's 30 year history is the continuity of our senior leadership.  We took another step this week in the evolution of the management of the firm by announcing that Dan Doctoroff will become Chief Executive Officer of Bloomberg LP (effective August 1).  Dan has been President of the company (a title he will retain) for the past 4 years and has been instrumental in the recent growth of the firm and in building and managing our increasingly complex business model.  In adding the role of CEO, Dan will manage all day-to-day operations of the company.  He will still report to Peter Grauer - who has been our Chairman for the past 10 years and will continue to play an active role leading the company.

Bloomberg's success the past several decades has been primarily based on the extraordinary success of the Bloomberg Terminal, which provides financial information, analytics and news to financial professionals around the world.  And, of course, Bloomberg News has become a world leader in business and financial media and an essential contributor to the value of the Bloomberg Terminal.  We've also diversified to include new businesses, including Bloomberg Enterprise Products & Solutions, Bloomberg Data Solutions, Bloomberg Trading Solutions, Bloomberg Tradebook, Bloomberg Government, Bloomberg Law and Bloomberg New Energy Finance, among others.  The continued success of the Bloomberg Terminal and Bloomberg News plus the addition of these new businesses led to a record financial performance for the company in 2010.  With this streamlined management structure, the company is well-positioned to continue to grow and prosper in the coming years.

And one other exciting announcement:  Tom Secunda, one of the original four founders of Bloomberg LP, was named Vice Chairman of the company.  Tom has been at the forefront of our success over the past 30 years and manages our Financial Products business and Research and Development team.

You can read the press release here.

 

Rick Powell is Bloomberg's Chief Communications Officer