Clearwire shares rise on report of Sprint talks

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Clearwire Corp shares rose 12 percent on Tuesday after a CNBC report that its biggest shareholder, Sprint Nextel , was in active talks to buy the rest of the company.

Citing unnamed people close to the situation, CNBC said Sprint was in active discussions to buy 49 percent of Clearwire and that a deal may be announced before year's end.

Sprint has been in talks with other Clearwire shareholders, which include Bright House, Intel Corp and Comcast Corp in recent days to buy their stock at about $3.00 per share, according to the story.

CNBC said that Sprint's offer price for the 488 million shares that are held by the public remains unclear.

Sprint and Clearwire declined to comment on the story.

Clearwire shares rose 29 cents, or 12 percent, to $2.69 on Nasdaq after the report.

(Reporting By Sinead Carew; Editing by Maureen Bavdek)