Activist Investor Starboard Value May Push Newscorp to Sell REA Group and Realtor.com

October 17, 2023

The U.S. hedge fund Starboard Value may be about to push Newscorp to sell off its two prized real estate portal assets, REA Group in Australia and Realtor.com in the United States.

According to a report by Reuters which quoted anonymous sources, the activist investor recently bought shares in the Murdoch-controlled media company.

Starboard has a history of pushing for changes at the companies it invests in and was one of the loudest voices behind eBay's sale of its classifieds division to Adevinta in 2020.

Newscorp's market cap currently stands at around $12.5 billion with Starboard said to value the company's portfolio at closer to $20 billion. A Wall Street Journal article said that the hedge fund values Newscorp's crown jewel, the Australian portal company REA Group, at $8 billion alone.

The other Newscorp real estate asset under scrutiny is Move, Inc. the parent company of Realtor.com. In January the portal was almost sold off to CoStar for a reported $3 billion. Since then CoStar has invested heavily in organically building up its own real estate portal asset, Homes.com and recently claimed that it has taken the number two spot from Realtor.com.

Starboard is not the only Newscorp investor that would like to see a change. Reuters reports that Irenic Capital Management last year pushed News Corp to spin off its real estate assets and Dow Jones, the publisher of the Wall Street Journal. Any spin-off or outright sale would almost certainly need approval from the Murdoch family who own 39% of Newscorp's voting shares.

October 17, 2023
Since March 2020 Edmund's job has been to read about, write about, collect data on, analyse and generally know about real estate marketplaces and the companies that run them. Before that he worked at the aggregator Mitula Group (which became Lifull Connect) for five years.

Subscribe to our mailing list to get the famous, free Friday newsletter!

News and analysis to help build better online marketplace businesses, in your inbox, every Friday

Related News

Developer Generic Background
Product Roundup: Hemnet, Green Acres, FazWaz, Property Sorted and Leboncoin

Here are the product and services updates we've spotted coming from real estate marketplaces around the world this week...  ...

Read More
Affordability Calculators 1 1
Affordability Fears Are Growing – Are Real Estate Portals Paying Attention?

Only around 40% of listings on Zillow are affordable. Or, to put it another way, only around 40% of properties...

Read More
People Roundup Hero Image 3 April 25 2
People on the Move Roundup: REW, ImmoScout24 and REA India

This week's roundup of real estate marketplace comings and goings features executives on the move in Canada, Germany and India......

Read More
Cooperrocketacq 3
Rocket to Acquire Mr Cooper Mortgage Service for $9.4 Billion

Rocket Companies has announced a $9.4 billion all-share deal to acquire Mr. Cooper, the largest mortgage servicer in the United...

Read More

Editor's Pick