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Technology Stocks : METROMEDIA FIBER NETWORK (MFNX) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: GraceZ who wrote (1479)	7/22/2001 10:12:31 AM
From: John Biddle	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1983

Metromedia holders want more value marketwatch.com Metromedia holders want more value By CBS.MarketWatch.com Last Update: 1:30 PM ET July 21, 2001 NEW YORK (CBS.MW) -- Disparity between the monumental personal wealth of John Werner Kluge and three of his companies, which haven't fared as well as their owner, were pointed out Saturday in a Barron's article. Kluge, who has a personal fortune of $10.9 billion, controls Metromedia International Group (MMG:news, chart, profile) , Metromedia Fiber Network (MFNX: news, chart, profile) and Big City Radio (YFM: news, chart, profile). According to Barron's, the California Public Employees' Retirement System, owner of some 600,000 shares of Metromedia stock, identified the company last March as one with "poor financial and corporate governance performance." Some shareholders have launched efforts to make management improve the financial situation at the companies, including sales or spinoffs of attractive units such as lawn-care company Snapper. A New York money manager, for example, has initiated a proxy fight to get two outside directors onto the Metromedia International board. Critics fear Kluge would try to take his companies private at a low price, Barron's reports, then strip off assets for an attractive profit. Kluge performed a similar feat in the 1980s, taking Metromedia private, selling broadcast properties that became the Fox network, and later returning the company to the publicly traded sector. One impediment to that scenario, notes Barron's, is that News Corp. (NWS: news, chart, profile) owns 9 percent of Metromedia International shares and would not be likely to accept a shearing. Shares of Metromedia International closed Friday up a penny to $2.16 a share. Metromedia Fiber Network declined by 11.5 percent, or 16 cents, to close at $1.23, and Big City Radio shed 5 cents to finish the week at $3.