Bloomberg chair leaves Blackstone board over Thomson Reuters

bloomberg Bloomberg chairman Peter Grauer will step down from Blackstone Group’s board after the money manager announced a $17.3 billion deal for the financial terminals and data unit of Bloomberg rival Thomson Reuters.

Peter Wells of the Financial Times writes, “Mr Grauer informed Blackstone he would resign from the board effective immediately, according to a regulatory filing on Friday.

“Blackstone’s decision to take a controlling stake in the Thomson Reuters unit puts the group in direct competition with Bloomberg, whose terminals are ubiquitous in the financial industry.

“While there is no legal requirement that Mr Grauer resign, he ‘felt this was the appropriate step given the appearance and potential of a conflict’ Blackstone said in a statement late on Friday. His departure reduces the number of people on the board to 10 members.”

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Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.