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Tribune Media's three largest shareholders are looking to sell 25 percent of their combined stake through a secondary offering, the Chicago-based media company said Wednesday.

Oaktree Capital Management; Angelo, Gordon & Co.; and JPMorgan Chase, the former senior creditors who guided Tribune Co. out of bankruptcy, want to divest 9.2 million shares of Class A common stock through the proposed secondary offering. The selling shareholders also will grant underwriters an option to buy nearly 1.4 million additional shares, according to a registration statement filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The total value of the offering could be nearly $654 million, at a proposed maximum price of $61.53 per share, according to the filing. Tribune Media will not receive any proceeds from the secondary offering.

Oaktree, Angelo Gordon and JPMorgan own about 39 percent of Tribune Media's 94.5 million outstanding shares of Class A stock, according to the filing. Their combined stake would be reduced to less than 28 percent after the offering, assuming the underwriters' option is exercised in full.

The offering is being made through an underwriting group led by Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan Securities.

The proposed sale has long been part of the plan for the former senior creditors, who took control of Tribune Co., now Tribune Media, after it emerged from a protracted Chapter 11 bankruptcy in December 2012.

Chicago billionaire Sam Zell took Tribune Co. private in 2007 in a heavily leveraged buyout, burying the company under $13 billion in debt as the Great Recession unfolded. Tribune Co. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in December 2008.

Investment firms Oaktree and Angelo Gordon opportunistically bought up the company's debt during the bankruptcy; JPMorgan was lead lender in the 2007 buyout.

Tribune Media, which spun off its publishing assets in August, including the Chicago Tribune and Los Angeles Times, owns and operates 42 local television stations, national cable channel WGN America, WGN Radio and other broadcasting assets, as well as real estate holdings and equity investments. It began trading on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol TRCO in December.

rchannick@tribpub.com

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Tribune Media's largest shareholders to sell 25 percent stake