News Corp. in talks to sell real estate business to CoStar for $3 billion - report (update)
Kevin Hagen/Getty Images News

Update 9:20am: Updates shares, adds additional reporting on timing

News Corp. (NASDAQ:NWSA) is in discussions to sell its Move Inc. online real estate unit to CoStar Group (NASDAQ:CSGP) for $3 billion. News Corp. rose 3.6% in premarket trading.

A deal could be announced within days, according to a Bloomberg report from late Tuesday, which cited people familiar. Move is the parent of Realtor.com and other real estate-related websites. The price could be more than $3 billion and it could be announced within weeks, not days, according to a separate CNBC report.
The report comes as investor Irenic Capital Management has been pushing for the company to spin off its real estate businesses.  News Corp. (NWSA) agreed to buy Move Inc. from REA Group in 2014 for about $950 million.

The news also comes as Rupert Murdoch on Tuesday killed his idea to reassemble his media empire, ending the proposal to re-merge News Corp. (NWSA) with Fox Corp. (FOX).
âIrenic is encouraged that Executive Chairman Rupert Murdoch and Co-Chairman Lachlan Murdoch have concluded that a combination with Fox is not in the best interests of News Corp and its shareholders," Adam Katz, co-founder and chief investment officer of Irenic, said in a statement late Tuesday. "This is the right decision."