In February 2009 the company entered into an agreement with Fexco to acquire 100% of its shares for $ 159.9 million. In October 2006 the company made an initial public offering of shares on the New York Stock Exchange, becoming independent from First Data company. In 1991, Western Union has sold some low-profit division of the company AT & T, GM Hughes Electronics, and to some others. In the same year the company changed its name to New Valley Corp. Thanks to cooperation with Western Union the Associated Press at the end of the XIX century took almost monopolistic position in the U.S. market news. In 1849, Selden and Sibley, the founders of the future Western Union, created the New York State Printing Telegraph Company. In October 1871 the company Western Union began to provide money transfer services, drawing on its own extensive telegraph network. Sibley, the founder of Western Union, did not build a new telegraph lines, and persuaded the other players to join. American Telegraph Company, however, still had to buy it.