This comes a week after the group's shareholding was increased from 4.9 per cent in response to Seven and Prime's tie-up plans announced in mid-October,with Prime investors given 0.4582 Seven shares for each share they have in the regional TV network. This was about a 3 per cent discount to the share price at the time.
Mr Catalano's tightening grip on Prime came as regional broadcasters and media owners met in Wagga Wagga with Communications Minister Paul Fletcher on Wednesday to discuss better ways to support struggling rural newsrooms.
"We know that regional and local journalism is under pressure,"Mr Fletcher said."There’s huge transition occurring in the media sector in Australia and globally,driven by the rise of the digital platforms,companies like Facebook and Google."
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Mr Fletcher said this week he wanted to wait until the Prime and Seven deal played out beforemaking any major decisions about changing media ownership rules.
Seven,which revealed plans to merge with Prime in October,has faced speculation that Mr Catalano could look to derail the deal in its current form. It is not clear whether this would be blocking the deal,which under a scheme of arrangement requires approval from 50 per cent of shareholders and 75 per cent of votes cast,though sources familiar with Mr Catalano's plans believe he is pushing for a re-shaping of the deal.
This could be to include regional newspaper business ACM,which Mr Catalano bought in July from Nine Entertainment Co for $115 million. Nine is the owner of this masthead.