Look for changes at the NY Times…
They only have $44 million in cash on hand. Monthly burn rate looks to be about negative $30 million a month. Most of their controllable expenses are people. Expect a writers and editors to be on the street, the dividend to be eliminated, and management layers to be cut.
What happens when you throw away your credibility
They have a lot of long term assets – other papers, property, so forth. So they can probably use their line of credit against those. And they will have to sell some of them, at absolutely the wrong time to sell assets.
Something will have to change in next few months or they will hit bottom – not have enough cash on hand to continue to operate.
Remember… you can help speed their demise. If you have to read them, make sure your ad blocker is blocks on their site before you make the jump.
November 19th, 2008 at 6:11 am
Post hoc ergo propter hoc. NY Times circulation and profitability decline as you perceive a credibility problem with its printed newspaper. Therefore the loss of credibility caused the decline? Have you considered the considerable responsible study of the news industry and print media since the rise of the Internet?
November 19th, 2008 at 8:00 am
Sure the Internet has had its say on them. But other franchises aren’t as bad off. Like the WSJ.