Categories: OLD Media Moves

Rough 2008 ahead for Financial Times?

Lionel Laurent of Forbes writes Tuesday about how a slowing U.S. economy could negatively impact The Financial Times.

LaurentÂ noted that French billionaire Bernard Arnault, owner of Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessey, is also interested in purchasing the newspaper.

Laurent wrote, “But the issue of the Financial Times does have an effect on Pearson shareholders, especially since last summer’s acquisition of Dow Jones by Rupert Murdoch‘s News Corp.Â The worry is that the salmon-colored pages of the F.T., let alone the subscriber base of FT.com, will not be able to compete against Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal or the Fox Business Network. (See “Has Pearson Lost Britain’s Media Wars?”)

“‘The Financial Times is doing very well,’ said a spokesman for Pearson Tuesday. ‘Circulation growth has been clear throughout the year. Advertising growth has been strong throughout the year.’

“The Financial Times itself reported last week that Pearson was poised to sell its stake in German sister paper FT Deutschland, despite a clear ‘no comment’ from the company. Given that Pearson has offloaded the brand in France and Spain, pressure could build once more for a sale of the core British publication.”

Read more here.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.