{"id":249163,"date":"2025-11-07T11:04:07","date_gmt":"2025-11-07T11:04:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/249163\/"},"modified":"2025-11-07T11:04:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-07T11:04:07","slug":"itv-shares-soar-as-it-holds-talks-to-sell-television-business-to-sky-itv","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/249163\/","title":{"rendered":"ITV shares soar as it holds talks to sell television business to Sky | ITV"},"content":{"rendered":"

ITV has told the market it is in preliminary talks to sell its broadcasting arm<\/a> to the parent company of Sky in a \u00a31.6bn deal, sending shares soaring by almost 20%.<\/p>\n

Comcast, the US telecom company that owns NBCUniversal, hopes to snap up ITV\u2019s media and entertainment operations, which include its free-to-air TV channels in the UK and ITVX streaming platform.<\/p>\n

However, the deal does not involve the programme-making arm ITV<\/a> Studios, one of the world\u2019s biggest production companies. The division, which has made shows including Love Island, I\u2019m a Celebrity and the hit drama Mr Bates vs the Post Office, has been the subject of separate takeover talks.<\/p>\n

ITV said there could \u201cbe no certainty\u201d about the terms of a potential sale, or whether the sale would even take place.<\/p>\n

The comments sent ITV\u2019s share price climbing by 18% to 80.9p on Friday morning, meaning its shares are up almost 9% year-to-date. It is the top riser on the FTSE 250 index, lifting the company\u2019s total value to about \u00a33bn, up from just over \u00a32.5bn on Thursday night.<\/p>\n

However, the combination of the TV ad sales operations of ITV and Sky<\/a> could prompt competition concerns, giving Comcast potential control of more than 70% of the UK market.<\/p>\n

Industry sources have said Sky may have to look at remedies, including relinquishing its third-party sales deals, which include representing ad sales for Channel 5 and Disney in the UK. That may require the competitions regulator to reconsider how it measures the ad market to include digital advertising.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere can be no certainty as to the terms upon which any potential sale may be agreed or whether any transaction will take place,\u201d ITV said in a statement to the market<\/a> on Friday. \u201cA further announcement will be made in due course, if appropriate.\u201d<\/p>\n

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ITV announced on Thursday that it would temporarily cut \u00a335m from its budgets<\/a> \u2013 including by delaying some shows into 2026 and reducing marketing spending \u2013 amid the challenging macroeconomic environment and advertiser uncertainty in the run-up to the budget this month.<\/p>\n

The company said it expected advertising revenues, which still account for most of its income, to fall by 9% in the crucial fourth-quarter advertising period in the lead-up to Christmas.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ITV has told the market it is in preliminary talks to sell its broadcasting arm to the parent…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":249164,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[96,391,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-249163","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-tv","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249163","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=249163"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249163\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/249164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=249163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=249163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=249163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}