Tribune Update from Mark Lacter

*Zell ups Tribune investment

By Mark Lacter

*Update: Oops. Zell is adding another $65 million to his initial investment of $250 million, though contrary to earlier wire reports that I used in my earlier post, the infusion had been part of the original deal. So nothing unexpected. Tribune stock took a big hit this morning, falling as low as $30.81, but it has since recovered to $32.32 (the buyout price is $34 a share). All this comes after a Chicago Tribune story that had bankers expressing doubts about funding the Tribune purchase. And for good reason: the credit markets are still crummy, which means that they'll be shouldering the debt loads themselves. And Tribune isn't exactly Google when it comes to attracting investors.

While all this is going on, the WSJ reports that radio executive Randy Michaels is expected to join the company in the next few days. What he'll do is not known. Tribune announced this morning that CEO Dennis FitzSimons will leave once the deal is complete. And in another interesting nugget, the Chicago Tribune reports this morning that Zell will become Tribune CEO, suggesting that he'll have a hands-on role in reshaping the company, at least in the beginning (it's hard to believe that he'll be in the CEO spot for long).