Cablevision Sets Another $500 Million Debt Offering; Discloses Large Writedown On Newsday Purchase

There are two interesting tidbits this morning from Cablevision (CVC) . For starters, the cable company disclosed in an SEC filing that it expects to take a pre-tax, non-cash impairment charge of $375 million to $450 million of its newspaper holding group, which mostly consists of Newsday, the Long Island-based tabloid it bought in May 2008 for $650 million . This would seem to confirm what some observers suspected when they did the deal: Cablevision chose an unfortunate time to get into the publishing business, and overpaid to boot. Meanwhile, the company’s CSC Holdings unit announced plans for a $500 debt offering ; the company did a nearly identical deal a month ago. The offering, which consists of senior notes to be sold to certain institutional investors, is exempt from SEC registration requirements. The company plans to use proceeds to refinance existing debt obligations. CVC today is down a penny, at $15.10. (link)