Facestagram deal goes through for $747m

When Facebook first announced plans to buy Instagram it made headlines around the globe. Rightly so too, this was a billion dollar deal. Except it hasn’t turned out quite that way.

The deal’s still going through, of course. The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) approved it a few hours ago. Now though it’s worth a great deal less at US$747-million. US$300-million of that will be in cash, while the rest will me made up in Facebook stock valued at US$19.44 a share.

In fact, the massive fall in Facebook’s share price is largely to blame for the US$250-million or so less that Instagram’s getting out of the buyout. The reports of the billion dollar deal were, of course, based on pre-IPO share pricing.

According to TechCrunch, the FTC unanimously voted to close its investigation of the deal. That’s a big step toward the two companies being able to integrate fully.

Facebook’s statement of response to the investigation closing gave no indication of when things would be finalised: “We are pleased that the Federal Trade Commission has cleared the transaction after its careful and thorough review,” it said.

While there have already been changes from both parties hinting at tighter integration (such as Facebook becoming the top share button in Instagram 3.0), you can’t help but get the nagging feeling that Facebook is steadily trying to buy out everything that can possibly compete with it.