BT Advised on $821M Outdoor Ad Deal

BT Alex. Brown Inc. advised Clear Channel Communications Inc. on its planned $821 million acquisition of a London outdoor advertising company, which was announced last week.

Clear Channel, San Antonio, made a $725 million cash tender offer for More Group PLC last week. If the deal closes, Clear Channel would also assume $96 million of More Group's debt.

Clear Channel executives are to decide in a few weeks what mix of debt and equity to use to fund the bid, according to Houston Lane, Clear Channel's vice president of finance. He said the company is waiting until the deal, which is subject to shareholder and British regulatory approval, appears more certain.

"Clearly the cost of this deal exceeds our current revolver," Mr. Lane said. Clear Channel, which has been aggressively acquiring media and outdoor advertising companies in recent months, has a $1.7 billion revolving credit facility led by NationsBank Corp., Charlotte, N.C.

NationsBank has led Clear Channel's last several credit facilities. Bankers Trust does not have a commercial banking relationship with the company.

But investment bankers at Alex. Brown, the Baltimore securities firm acquired by Bankers Trust New York Corp. last October, have had a relationship with Clear Channel since 1992, when they began leading the company's equity issues.

BT Alex. Brown co-managed the company's first and only issue of public debt-a $300 million investment-grade bond last October led by Salomon Smith Barney and Credit Suisse First Boston.

BT Alex. Brown investment bankers have also spent time on the other side of the table in Clear Channel's acquisitions. They advised Eller Media Corp. of Phoenix when it was bought by Clear Channel last March for $1.15 billion. BT Alex. Brown is also an adviser to Universal Outdoor Holdings Inc. of Chicago, which Clear Channel expects to buy soon for $2.1 billion. Both are also outdoor advertisers.

Clear Channel-which owns 184 radio stations and 18 television stations in North America, Asia, and Europe-only began acquiring billboard advertising companies in the last nine months. But outdoor advertising now accounts for roughly half its revenues, according to company executives.

Clear Channel had $63.6 million of net income last year, on $790.2 million of revenue.

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