Nexstar Offers to Buy Media General for $1.85 Billion

The Nexstar Broadcasting Group said that it had made an unsolicited offer to buy Media General for $1.85 billion in cash and stock, potentially upending Media General’s recent bid for the Meredith Corporation. The proposal comes less than three weeks after Media General offered to pay $2.4 billion for its rival Meredith, the publisher of Better Homes and Gardens magazine and owner of a variety of local television stations. Media General said at the time that the Meredith deal would create one of the largest owners of broadcast network affiliates in the United States, with annual revenue of about $3 billion. The combined company would have 88 stations in 54 markets and reach about 30 percent of American television households.