McClatchy Co. notified a federal bankruptcy judge on Wednesday that it needs more time to negotiate the terms of its sale to the New Jersey hedge fund that won the company at auction last week, the Sacramento Bee reported. Chatham Asset Management was named Sunday as the winning bidder for the nation’s second largest local news company, and McClatchy said at the time that it expected to reach agreement on terms before the court’s 11:59 p.m. ET Wednesday deadline. Instead, less than an hour before that deadline, McClatchy announced that a deal was close, but not yet done. “The parties are still in the process of finalizing the transactional documents and expect to file such documents on or before Friday, July 17, 2020,” lawyers for McClatchy said in a filing that hit the court docket just after 11 p.m. In a statement after the filing, McClatchy called the negotiations “a multiparty process.” “All of us, along with Chatham, are working productively, around-the-clock, and there are very few details left to hammer out,” the statement said. The delay is the third since July 8, when the auction was initially scheduled, then postponed twice. McClatchy did not disclose what the sticking points might be, and representatives for Chatham did not respond to an email seeking comment. Bankruptcy Judge Michael E. Wiles is scheduled to sign off on the agreement at a hearing on July 24.
