• Reuters, Thursday, December 3, 2009 2:44 PM

Barry Diller has a problem. The IAC/InterActiveCorp head apparently has too much cash on hand -- nearly $2 billion -- and doesn't know what to do with all of it. The consummate media dealmaker just doesn't think there are any good acquisition targets out there. "It's a looming problem," Diller said at the Reuters Global Media Summit in New York on Wednesday. "The only thing worse than spending cash stupidly is essentially not to put it down at all."

In the meantime, IAC has continued to build its cash reserve and used some of it to buy back stock, but shareholders have reportedly been frustrated by the fact that IAC trades at a discount to peers like Yahoo at around five times earnings. Diller says the current challenges in the media market -- battered by the advertising downturn, Internet and new technologies -- are unlike any he's faced before.

Asked about the prospect of major mergers and acquisitions in the media sector, Diller said, "There are so many tectonic plates that are shifting in media and Internet universe that I think almost everything is more of a challenge than I think is an opportunity."

Read the whole story at Reuters »