The $500 million sale of two of the most liberal publications in Taiwan to largely pro-Beijing investors appeared on the verge of collapse on Tuesday.
The buyers were unlikely to meet a Wednesday deadline to complete the sale of the Taiwan editions of the publications, The Apple Daily newspaper and Next magazine, which are owned by the staunchly anti-Communist Hong Kong media magnate Jimmy Lai, a spokesman for Mr. Lai’s Next Media said Tuesday.
“The deal is off,†said the spokesman, Mark Simon. He said the buyers, who included the son of Tsai Eng-meng, a pro-China Taiwan billionaire, had declined Monday to negotiate to extend a deadline to complete the deal.
“They pulled out,’’ Mr. Simon said.
News of the sale, announced late last year, had caused concerns in democratically governed Taiwan that pro-Beijing businessmen were increasingly taking control of the island’s media industry.
Tens of thousands of opposition protesters took to the streets in January to protest against President Ma Ying-jeou, who has brokered increasingly warm ties with mainland China but who is struggling with low approval ratings at home. Among other things, the protesters demanded that the government prevent the sale of the Next Media publications.
Taiwan’s legislature is considering measures supported by opposition parties that would ban monopoly holdings in the media and cap market share for print and broadcast companies.
In the deal for certain Next Media publications, the buyers looked to expand their industry presence.
The buyer, Mr. Tsai’s son, Tsai Shao-chung, is the president of the Want Want China Times group, which publishes a newspaper and operates Web sites in Taiwan. The elder Mr. Tsai, who heads a food and beverage conglomerate with considerable sales and operations in mainland China, also has stakes in a television channel and several other media operations in Taiwan.
The other members of the buying consortium include Jeffrey Koo Jr., the son of the chairman of Chinatrust Financial, a bank; Wang Wen-yun, the Formosa Plastics chief executive; and Li Shih- tsung, the head of Lung Yen Life Service, a funeral and cemetery company.
In November, the group signed a preliminary agreement with Next Media to pay 16 billion Taiwan dollars, or $534 million, to acquire the publications. Mr. Lai also publishes Hong Kong editions of both The Apple Daily and Next magazine, which were not part of the transaction.
Faced with the vocal public opposition, regulators in Taiwan have been examining the Next Media deal for months. “We’re trying to judge whether the buyer has the potential to abuse monopolistic power,†said Sun Li-chyun, a spokesman for Taiwan’s Fair Trade Commission.
It appeared Tuesday that there was still some small sliver of hope for the deal. Mr. Sun said the commission had been planning to issue a decision early next month on the Next Media transaction. He said that when the commission had checked with lawyers representing both Mr. Lai’s group and the buyers on Tuesday morning, neither party said the sale had been canceled.
Lin Yang reported from Taipei.
