Mike Bloomberg says he may sell his media company if he runs for president

Michael Bloomberg.
Andrew
Burton/Getty Images

• Michael Bloomberg told a radio interviewer this week that if
  he runs for president he will sell his financial data and news
  operation, or place it in a blind trust. 
• The 76-year-old added that at the very least, he’d like to
  sell the company before he dies. 

Michael Bloomberg, the founder of the eponymous financial data
and news operation, said he is likely to sell his company if he
runs for president, according to an interview he gave to a local
radio station. 

Bloomberg said he would either sell the company or put it in a
blind trust, but that at his age, 76, it makes more sense to sell
it,
according to an interview he gave to Radio Iowa.

“I think at my age, if selling it is possible, I would do that,”
Bloomberg said, adding that at the very least he wants to sell
the company before he dies. “At some point, you’re going to die
anyway, so you want to do it before then.”

Bloomberg LP has more than 300,000 terminals installed on trading
desks across Wall Street and London’s financial district, the
City, in addition to hundreds of locations around the world. The
firm competes with Refinitiv, the company formerly known as
Thomson Reuters. Bloomberg also owns a massive media operation,
which has long been considered reliant on a subsidy from the
terminal business to stay afloat. 

This is the not the first time Bloomberg has considered running
for president. In the run-up to the 2016 elections, the former
New York City mayor commissioned an examination of his chances
only to decide against a run after that effort found he had
little chance of winning. In September, the
New York Times said Bloomberg was formally considering a bid for
president, anonymously citing his
advisers. 

Bloomberg, who was a member of the Republican party when he
served as New York City mayor, recently re-registered as a
Democrat.  

Bloomberg spent $80 million in support of Democrats in the 2018
midterm elections.