Will Liberty Global (LBTYA) Stock Gain Today on Vodafone Merger Talk?

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NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Shares of Liberty Global (LBTYA) are slightly lower at $51.80 in pre-market trading after sources told Bloomberg that Vodafone Group (VOD) is considering a combination with John Malone's companyto create a European phone, Internet and TV company valued at more than $130 billion.

The British phone company is holding internal deliberations and analyzing the financial and regulatory hurdles as well as investor support for a share-based transaction, the sources said.

No formal negotiations with Liberty are under way, there's no guarantee a deal will be reached, and valuation and regulatory issues remain key obstacles, the sources added. In particular, Vodafone has concerns about the combined company's debt levels and the reaction of its own investors to a deal, one source noted, Bloomberg reports.

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Will Liberty Global (LBTYA) Stock Gain Today on Vodafone Merger Talk?

Liberty Global's John Malone Would Only Buy Vodafone With Stock

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NEW YORK ( TheStreet) -- If billionaire media mogul John Malone does decide to merge his sprawling international cable-TV company Liberty Global (LBTYA) with the U.K.-based wireless carrier Vodafone (VOD) , it's more than likely the deal wouldbe structured as an all-stock transaction to avoid most taxes, said corporate tax consultant Robert Willens.

Malone, as famous for shaping cable-TV in the U.S. and the world as for his aversion to paying taxes, is said to be considering overtures from Vodafone to combine the two companies, according to a reportfrom Bloomberg News. Vodafone, which operates mobile-telephone service throughout Europe, Asia and parts of South America, is under pressure to acquire fixed-line assets to offset rival BT's (BT) efforts to acquire a wireless provider in the United Kingdom.

Must Read: 10 Stocks George Soros Is Buying

Vodafone covets Liberty Global's extensive broadband network as more media companies offer news and entertainment offerings online that historically have been available only through cable or satellite-TV.Malone, who is also chairman of Liberty Global as well as Liberty Media (LMCA) and Liberty Interactive (QVCA) , has long made acquisitions based in part on whether he could avoid paying taxes.

"If he were to do a deal, it would have to be structured as a tax-free reorganization," said Willens, who worked at Lehman Brothers for 20 years prior to the firm's dissolution in 2008. "That would mean Vodafone would pay in stock, exchanging their shares for Liberty shares in a tax-free merger transaction."

"The reason investors like investing longtime with Malone is because he always rationale, never emotionally attached to any of his businesses," said Amy Yong, a media analyst atMacquarie Securitiessaid in a phone interview from New York. "It will all depend on how a deal is structured, how much voting rights he would have, whether it's cash or stock, tax efficiencies, seats on the board but whenever there's a Malone entity, they've shown they're open to it." Liberty Global's revenue for 2014 is expected to surpass $18 billion on operations that serve roughly 27 million customers in markets that include Germany, the U.K., Chile and Puerto Rico. Its market capitalization is $39.4 billion, just about even with its debt load of $41.1 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Having sold nearly all of his U.S. cable-TV assets in 1999, Malone has spent more than $40 billion buying pay-TV assets in Europe. A deal would likely pass regulatory hurdles in Europe although some Germany-based assets would likely need to be divested, Ratcliffe added. Requests for comment from Liberty Global and Vodafone weren't immediately returned. Must Read:Starz May Finally Be Sold in Another Killer Deal for John Malone -- Written by Leon Lazaroff in New York Contact by Email. Follow @LeonLazaroff

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Liberty Global's John Malone Would Only Buy Vodafone With Stock

Vodafone Drops Amid Plan for Tie-Up With Liberty Global

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Vodafone Group Plc (VOD) fell as much as 4.2 percent after people with knowledge of the matter said the company is considering a combination with John Malones Liberty Global Plc (LBTYA) to create a European phone, Internet and TV company valued at more than $130 billion.

The British phone company is holding internal deliberations and analyzing the financial and regulatory hurdles as well as investor support for a share-based transaction, the people said, asking not to be identified because the matter is private.

No formal negotiations with Liberty are under way, theres no guarantee a deal will be reached, and valuation and regulatory issues remain key obstacles, the people said. In particular, Vodafone has concerns about the combined companys debt levels and the reaction of its own investors to a deal, one of the people said.

The case for a combination has been strengthened after BT Group Plc, the former U.K. phone monopoly, entered talks to buy either Telefonica SAs O2 unit or EE, the wireless carrier co-owned by Orange SA and Deutsche Telekom AG, two of the people said. The likelihood of a deal has also increased as Vodafone bolsters its fixed-line operations and Liberty moves toward offering mobile services in some markets, they said.

Vodafones Chief Executive Officer Vittorio Colao, when asked in September whether Liberty Global would be a good fit for the wireless carrier, said he would consider buying it for the right price. Close

Vodafones Chief Executive Officer Vittorio Colao, when asked in September whether... Read More

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Vodafones Chief Executive Officer Vittorio Colao, when asked in September whether Liberty Global would be a good fit for the wireless carrier, said he would consider buying it for the right price.

While Vodafone is examining several options in the wake of BTs negotiations, Liberty remains the likeliest partner for a transaction, one of the people said.

Vodafone fell 3.9 percent to 224.75 pence at 9:04 a.m. in London after earlier dropping as low as 224.15 pence for the biggest intraday decline since June. Cable operator Libertys shares climbed 7.4 percent to $51.99 on Nov. 28 in New York.

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Vodafone Drops Amid Plan for Tie-Up With Liberty Global

Liberty Utilities to build water-recharge plant in Goodyear

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Water.(Photo: Getty Images/iStockphoto)

A private water company wants to build a 57-acre water-recharge facility and office complex in Goodyear near Luke Air Force Base and across the street from Litchfield Park.

Liberty Utilities and the Central Arizona Groundwater Replenishment District have partnered to build the state's first public-private reclaimed-water recharge facility. The groundwater replenishment district will pay for about $6 million of the potential $8 million project, and Liberty will pay the remaining $2 million, said Greg Sorensen, president of Liberty Utilities' Arizona and Texas divisions.

Liberty Utilities serves more than 17,500 water and wastewater customers in Maricopa County, mostly Goodyear residents who live north of Interstate 10 and Litchfield Park residents.

READ MORE: West Valley cities eyeing reclaimed water amid drought, population growth

The Central Arizona Groundwater Replenishment District is the groundwater replenishment authority of the Central Arizona Water Conservation District commonly known as the Central Arizona Project.

The project will impact water rates, though by how much isn't known. Ratepayers will pick up the $2 million cost to Liberty, Sorensen said.

"Anytime we invest money into utility assets, there ultimately will be an impact on rates," Sorensen said. "But because we are able to work with (the conservation district) and obtain $6 million in funding, that's $6 million we don't have to invest in the utility."

Construction of the project will begin next year and will be completed sometime in mid- to late-2016, depending on permitting, Sorensen said.

The proposed plant, north of Camelback Road between Sun Health and the Falcon Dunes Golf Course, will consist of a 15,000-square-foot office building and potentially six recharge basins built to hold reclaimed water that will percolate into the ground and the aquifer.

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Liberty Utilities to build water-recharge plant in Goodyear

New Zealand v Solomon Islands (Women) – Full Game – 2014 FIBA Oceania U19 Championship – Video

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New Zealand v Solomon Islands (Women) - Full Game - 2014 FIBA Oceania U19 Championship
Watch the full game New Zealand v Solomon Islands from the 2014 FIBA Oceania U19 Championship in Suva, Fiji on the FIBA YouTube channel. Subscribe to our YouTube channel ...

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New Zealand v Solomon Islands (Women) - Full Game - 2014 FIBA Oceania U19 Championship - Video

Predators and isolation shape the evolution of 'island tameness,' providing conservation insights

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PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

1-Dec-2014

Contact: Jim Erickson ericksn@umich.edu 734-647-1842 University of Michigan @umich

ANN ARBOR - Charles Darwin noted more than 150 years ago that animals on the Galapagos Islands, including finches and marine iguanas, were more docile than mainland creatures. He attributed this tameness to the fact that there are fewer predators on remote islands.

While "island tameness" is an old idea, there have been few rigorous studies of the phenomenon. Many aspects remain unclear, including the mechanisms behind it and the speed at which it evolves in island populations.

A new University of Michigan-led study of Aegean wall lizard populations on 37 Greek islands shows that island tameness is determined by both the diversity of the local predator populations and the length of time an island has been separated from the mainland.

The researchers found that as the diversity of predators on an island increases, so does the distance at which these small lizards start to flee when they are approached -- an anti-predator response which scientists call the flight initiation distance. In addition, they found that the longer an island has been isolated from the mainland, on average, the longer its resident Aegean wall lizards will wait before fleeing from a predator.

The results suggest that animals living on small, long-isolated islands face the greatest risk from introduced predators -- such as feral cats and rats -- and should therefore receive priority in conservation efforts, said U-M vertebrate ecologist Johannes Foufopoulos, co-author of a paper scheduled for online publication in the journal Evolution on Dec. 1.

"Being so fearless, these populations are extremely susceptible to any novel predator that's introduced. In fact, island tameness has caused numerous island-species extinctions at the hands of human-introduced predators and pets," said Foufopoulos, an associate professor at the U-M School of Natural Resources and Environment.

"Determining what factors lead to the loss of effective anti-predator responses is critical because it provides a fundamental understanding of evolutionary processes on islands and also helps conservation managers predict which island species are at most risk," he said.

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Predators and isolation shape the evolution of 'island tameness,' providing conservation insights

Duality in the human genome

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PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

28-Nov-2014

Contact: Dr. Patricia Marquardt patricia.marquardt@molgen.mpg.de 49-308-413-1716 Max-Planck-Gesellschaft @maxplanckpress

This news release is available in German.

Humans don't like being alone, and their genes are no different. Together we are stronger, and the two versions of a gene - one from each parent - need each other. Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics in Berlin have analysed the genetic makeup of several hundred people and decoded the genetic information on the two sets of chromosomes separately. In this relatively small group alone they found millions of different gene forms. The results also show that genetic mutations do not occur randomly in the two parental chromosome sets and that they are distributed in the same ratio in everyone.

In 2001 scientists announced the successful decoding of the first human genome. Since then, thousands more have been sequenced. The price of a genetic analysis will soon fall below the 1,000 dollar mark. Given this rapid pace of development, it's easy to forget that the technology used only reads a mixed product of genetic information. The analytical methods commonly employed do not take into account the fact that every person has two sets of genetic material. "So they are ignoring an essential property of the human genome. However, it's important to know, for example, how mutations are distributed between the two chromosome sets," says Margret Hoehe from the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics, who carried out the study.

Hoehe and her team have developed molecular genetic and bioinformatic methods that make it possible to sequence the two sets of chromosomes in a human separately. The researchers decoded the maternal and paternal parts of the genome in 14 people and supplemented their analysis with the genetic material of 372 Europeans from the 1000 Genomes Project. "Fourteen people may not sound like a lot, but given the technical challenge, it is an unprecedented achievement," says Hoehe.

The results show that most genes can occur in many different forms within a population: On average, about 250 different forms of each gene exist. The researchers found around four million different gene forms just in the 400 or so genomes they analysed. This figure is certain to increase as more human genomes are examined. More than 85 percent of all genes have no predominant form which occurs in more than half of all individuals. This enormous diversity means that over half of all genes in an individual, around 9,000 of 17,500, occur uniquely in that one person - and are therefore individual in the truest sense of the word.

The gene, as we imagined it, exists only in exceptional cases. "We need to fundamentally rethink the view of genes that every schoolchild has learned since Gregor Mendel's time. Moreover, the conventional view of individual mutations is no longer adequate. Instead, we have to consider the two gene forms and their combination of variants," Hoehe explains. When analysing genomes, scientists should therefore examine each parental gene form separately, as well as the effects of both forms as a pair.

According to the researchers, mutations of genes are not randomly distributed between the parental chromosomes. They found that 60 percent of mutations affect the same chromosome set and 40 percent both sets. Scientists refer to these as cis and trans mutations, respectively. Evidently, an organism must have more cis mutations, where the second gene form remains intact. "It's amazing how precisely the 60:40 ratio is maintained. It occurs in the genome of every individual - almost like a magic formula," says Hoehe. The 60:40 distribution ratio appears to be essential for survival. "This formula may help us to understand how gene variability occurs and how it affects gene function."

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Duality in the human genome

Introduction to Chiropractic for Newbies in Denver Aurora and Lakewood – Video

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Introduction to Chiropractic for Newbies in Denver Aurora and Lakewood
This is a quick video on chiropractic. It is dated but it gets the message across! Call us now for a FREE Free Spinal Exam Consultation at 303-922-2977. http://www.mydenverchiropractor.com/...

By: Aim High Chiropractic

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Introduction to Chiropractic for Newbies in Denver Aurora and Lakewood - Video

HD Video Feedback Volunteer David Montalbano Ecuador Quito Health Care Program – Video

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HD Video Feedback Volunteer David Montalbano Ecuador Quito Health Care Program
HD Video Feedback Volunteer David Montalbano Ecuador Quito Health Care Program https://www.abroaderview.org #volunteerabroad #quito #ecuador #abroaderview.

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HD Video Feedback Volunteer David Montalbano Ecuador Quito Health Care Program - Video