Cox President Pat Esser and officials from Liberty Media Corp engaged in talks on a potential deal. The structure of the said deal is still left undetermined according to a source familiar with the matter who asked not to be identified as talks were held private in nature. Liberty Media owns 27% stake in Charter Communications, an American firm offering cable TV, telephone and high-speed internet services to more the 5.8 million customers. According to the same source, the discussions did not name which company might be the acquirer. Furthermore, the source said that Cox and Charter have not started direct talks about a possible deal.
Liberty and Charter are also pursuing an on-going acquisition deal for Time Warner Cable Inc, said sources. John Malone, who controls Liberty Media, said that he wanted Charter to get bigger so it can gain leverage with TV network negotiations.
After the Bloomberg report on the interview with Cox, the share value of Charter increased by as much as 7.3% in New York trading. This was Charter's largest intraday gain in more than a month.
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