Consumer advocate Ralph Nader said Liberty Media Chairman John Malone’s offer to buy out the remaining stake in satellite radio company Sirius XM was “ludicrous” and called for activist investor Carl Icahn to take notice.
Nader, a Sirius shareholder, said on Monday that Liberty’s $3.68-a-share bid was below the $4 where the company was trading a few weeks ago.
“I am sure that I along with other shareholders in Sirius XM will be interested in a legal challenge to John Malone’s company for lowballing Sirius XM’s shareholder value,” the 79-year-old consumer crusader said in a statement. “Carl Icahn — take notice and interest.”
It was not immediately clear how many Sirius shares Nader owns. Nor was it clear whether Icahn is a shareholder of the company.
A spokeswoman for Liberty Media did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Liberty Media, which already owns about half of the satellite-radio company, made an offer Friday valuing the rest at $3.68 a share, or about $10.6 billion.
The stock closed at $3.83 today in New York, more than 4 percent higher than the bid by Liberty, an investment company controlled by billionaire John Malone.
The reaction signals that Liberty may face opposition in getting investors to approve the current deal.
Greg Maffei, the company’s chief executive officer, said last week that Liberty plans to tap the cash of Sirius to potentially finance other transactions, including a possible bid for Time Warner Cable.
Liberty Media is contemplating making a Time Warner Cable deal through another of its holdings, Charter Communications.
Sirius’s board is forming a committee of directors to consider Liberty Media’s proposal.