Rupert Murdoch to step down as CEO of 21st Century Fox

Rupert Murdoch, the 84-year-old chief executive of Twenty-First Century Fox, is preparing to step down and name his son James Murdoch as his successor at the media conglomerate, the company behind Fox News and the studio that makes the "X-Men" movies, CNBC and Bloomberg reported on Thursday.

The elder Murdoch will stay on as chairman, according to CNBC. James Murdoch, 42, will work in tandem with his brother, Lachlan Murdoch, 43, in a "partnership," the CNBC report said, adding that Rupert Murdoch will still have the final say in whatever goes on at Fox.

It was unclear whether the reorganization would take place this year or at the start of 2016, CNBC said.

The next Fox board meeting will discuss the matter of succession, the company said in a one-sentence statement.

The CNBC report said Chase Carey, the president and chief operating officer of Twenty-First Century Fox, would stay on at the company in a still undefined advisory role.

"The most important thing in the immediate term is that Chase Carey not leave,” said Needham & Co. analyst Laura Martin. "Wall Street really cares about Chase Carey running this business. So if the implication of Rupert handing the title to his son is that Chase Carey leaves in the near term, we would expect that to negatively impact the stock prices."

Fox shares were down 0.50 percent, at $32.79, and News Corp shares were off 0.23 percent, at $14.61, in early trading.

As of April, through a family trust, the Murdochs owned 39 percent of voting shares in Fox and in News Corp., the company that operates newspapers such as The Wall Street Journal and book publisher HarperCollins. Fox split from News Corp in 2013.

A Harvard University dropout, James Murdoch spent his early career as a cartoonist and a co-founder of the hip-hop music label Rawkus Records, which was bought by News Corp.

He joined News Corp in 1996 at the age of 23 and was soon installed as head of the company's Asian assets, including Star India. Four years later, he was named CEO of BSkyB, now known as Sky, which is 39 percent owned by Fox.

Some key investors have been warming to the idea that James Murdoch might run Fox.

In interviews, some top investors who know him and other people familiar with the company describe him as curious and a risk-taker like his father. But they also cite two big differences that they like: James Murdoch is less sentimental about certain assets than his father is and is more enthusiastic about courting shareholders.

"James is a giant," said Saudi Arabia's Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, a Murdoch family ally and one of Fox’s top shareholders, with a 6.6 percent voting stake, in a recent interview.

Reuters