Updated 11:20am - ATLANTA -- After three weeks of "exclusive merger negotiations" between Citadel and Cumulus, the latter (and larger) of the two companies announced this morning that the deal is done. Cumulus Media will acquire Citadel Broadcasting, the owner of 225 stations, including four in Syracuse.
Rumors had been swirling for quite some time -- and it wasn't necessarily a surprise when the initial "negotiations" announcement came down in mid-February... it wasn't the first time Cumulus had made a play for Citadel.
The deal confirmed this morning with a press release on the Cumulus website, means Cumulus will pay $37 to buy out each share of Citadel stock. That's $3 more than Citadel's closing price on Wednesday evening. Cumulus says it expects the merger to be complete by the end of 2011.
Added 11:20am - Citadel has released its own statement on the merger (PDF format). When we first published this story at 8:15am, Citadel had not yet made the announcement on its own website.
In Syracuse, Citadel owns rocker 95X (WAQX), top-40 93Q (WNTQ), 105.9 The Big Talker (WXTL) and sports-talk The Score 1260 (WSKO). The company also owns stations in Binghamton, Buffalo and New York City.
Cumulus doesn't have any properties in our immediate area -- their only New York properties are located in Poughkeepsie and Westchester.