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This Is How a Newspaper Dies - POLITICO Magazine (Freeman has, in the past, disputed Bainums account of the negotiations.) A quarter of the newsroom (including many big-name reporters, columnists and photographers) took the buyouts Alden offered, and while some great reporters remain on staff, it's nearly impossible for them to fill those gaps, Coppins says. All good works, and Knight is to be commended for them. If you went into a lab to create the perfect bro, Heath would be that creation, says one former executive at an Alden-owned company, who, like others in this story, requested anonymity to speak candidly. To many, it just didnt seem possible that Alden would instead choose to destroy newspapers by laying off the workforce en masse and stripping papers of all their assets. Baltimore has always had its problems, he told me. By the time the FBI caught them, in 2017, the conspiracy had resulted in one dead civilian and a rash of wrongful arrests and convictions. According to Aldens scarce SEC filings, it currently has fewer than 10 investors, most of them from overseas. But who most of those few souls are, and how much of the hundreds of millions skimmed from DFM papers theyve received remains a deep, dark mystery. The final product, completed in 1925, was an architectural spectacle unlike anything the city had seen beforeromance in stone and steel, as one writer described it. Caleb will later recall, in an interview with D Magazine, asking his dad why he works so hard. When The New York Times profiles him in 1991, it notes that he excels at profiting from other peoples misery and quotes a parade of disgruntled clients and partners. Alden Capital's gutting of the Denver Post is the most discussed example of this, but there are many others. By that point, Alden was widely known as the grim reaper of American newspapers, as Vanity Fair had put it, and news of the acquisition plans had unleashed a wave of panic across the industry. Or to nearby Monterey, where the former Herald reporter Julie Reynolds says staffers were pushed to stop writing investigative features so they could produce multiple stories a day. Alden Global to buy Tribune Publishing for $630 million - Los Angeles Times [13], Newspapers in Alden's portfolio include Chicago Tribune, The Denver Post, the St. Paul Pioneer Press, the Boston Herald, The Mercury News, East Bay Times, The Orange County Register, and Orlando Sentinel. In a news release Monday, Alden said it sent Lee's board a letter with the offer. For Freeman, newspapers are financial assets and nothing morenumbers to be rearranged on spreadsheets until they produce the maximum returns for investors. Smith began investing in newspapers and media around the same time. . It has not, however, retained the Chicago Tribune. By the charitys own accounting, it lost $ 2.3 million in book value on a $17 million investment that year. John Temple: My newspaper died 10 years ago. This is the story weve been telling for decades about the dying local-news industry, and its not without truth. Researchers at the University of North Carolina found that Alden-owned newspapers have cut their staff at twice the rate of their competitors; not coincidentally, circulation has fallen faster too, according to Ken Doctor, a news-industry analyst who reviewed data from some of the papers. [12] Lee owns daily newspapers in 77 markets in 26 states, and about 350 weekly and specialty publications. 'Sobs, gasps, expletives' over latest Denver Post layoffs", "The Hedge Fund Vampire That Bleeds Newspapers Dry Now Has the Chicago Tribune by the Throat", "How Massive Cuts Have Remade The Denver Post", "Newsonomics: By selling to Americas worst newspaper owners, Michael Ferro ushers the vultures into Tribune", "A Secretive Hedge Fund Is Gutting Newsrooms", "Affiliated Media Files for Bankruptcy to Restructure (Update2)", "The shakeup at MediaNews: Why it could be the leadup to a massive newspaper consolidation", "Alden Global Capital to buy Tribune in deal valued at $630 million", "Lee Enterprises Enacts Poison Pill to Guard Against Alden Takeover", "Lee Enterprises Board Rejects Alden's Acquisition Offer", "Alden Global Capital takes Lee Enterprises to court over failed board nominations", "Alden Global Capital sues Lee Enterprises after rejected takeover bid", "Alden Global Capital loses lawsuit to nominate its slate of candidates for Lee Enterprises' board", "Lee Enterprises shareholders reelect three directors amid hedge fund fight", "Tampa Bay Times sells printing plant to developer for $21 million", "A hedge fund's 'mercenary' strategy: Buy newspapers, slash jobs, sell the buildings", "The hedge fund trying to buy Gannett faces federal probe after investing newspaper workers' pensions in its own funds", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Alden_Global_Capital&oldid=1130942589, This page was last edited on 1 January 2023, at 19:27. Even in a declining industry, the newspapers still generated hundreds of millions of dollars in annual revenues; many of them were turning profits. How this 'vulture' hedge fund's gutting of local newsrooms could hurt By Julie Reynolds. Alden Global Capital, the hedge fund that owns the Chicago Tribune and New York Daily News, offered to buy Lee Enterprises Inc. for about $142 million, seeking a larger share of the . Im repulsed by the incestuous world of New York journalism, he tells New York magazine. Hedge fund Alden Global Capital, one of the country's largest newspaper owners with a reputation for intense cost cuts and layoffs, has offered to buy the local newspaper chain Lee Enterprises for . As a young man, hed studied at divinity school before taking over his fathers company, and decades later he still carried a healthy sense of noblesse oblige. The term vulture capitalism hasnt been invented yet, but Randy will come to be known as a pioneer in the field. [33], Alden Global Capital's management of American newspapers has been criticized. But beneath all the recriminations and infighting was a cruel reality: When faced with the likely decimation of the countrys largest local newspapers, most Americans didnt seem to care very much. The Tampa Bay Times has sold its printing plant at 1301 34th St. N to a real estate arm of Alden Global Capital, a New York hedge fund that is the second-largest newspaper owner in the country. But years later, when Randy relocates to Palm Beach and becomes a major donor to Donald Trumps presidential campaign, it will make a certain amount of sense that his earliest known media investment was conceived as a giant middle finger to the journalistic establishment. Orders for non-defence capital goods excluding aircraft a closely watched proxy for business investment, rose 0.8 per cent in January from a month earlier, comfortably above economists . Maybe theyd cancel their subscriptions eventually; maybe the papers would fold altogether. Instead, the money was used to finance the hedge funds other ventures. The $633 million sale made Alden the nation's second largest newspaper owner in terms of circulation, with more than 200 newspapers. The Tribune Tower rises above the streets of downtown Chicago in a majestic snarl of . As a privately held hedge fund, Alden doesnt have to reveal much to the public. Its the meanness and the elegance of the capitalist marketplace brought to newspapers, Doctor told me. Some in the city started to wonder if the paper was even worth saving. After a contentious presidential race and amid a still-raging pandemic, there was a limited supply of outrage and sympathy to spare for local reporters. This summer, Alden Global Capital acquired Tribune Publishing and its titles, from small community newspapers to major metro titles like its flagship, The Chicago Tribune, and The Baltimore Sun. About a month after The Baltimore Sun was acquired by Alden, a senior editor at the paper took questions from anxious reporters on Zoom. Many of the operators were looking at the newspaper business as a local advertising business, he said, and we didnt believe that was the right way to look at it. A young man named Randall Duncan SmithRandy for shortstands next to his wife, Kathryn, answering quick-fire trivia questions in front of a live studio audience. It hurts to see the paper like this, he told her. It is a subsidiary of Alden Global Capital, the New York City hedge fund that backed the purchase of and dramatic cost-cutting at more than 100 newspapers causing more than 1,000 lost jobs. Today, we know that Knight, CalPERS and others no longer invest with Alden. Alden Global Capital aims to buy Lee Enterprises | The Gazette This is a subscription-based business.. A century later, the Tribune Tower has retained its grandeur. The largest share of the blame was assigned to the Tribune board for allowing the sale to Alden to go through. As a reporter who's covered Alden Global Capital for more than two years, people often ask me who are the investors behind the hedge fund that owns one of America's largest newspaper chains?. He told me it will begin with an annual operating budget of $15 million, unprecedented for an outfit of this kind. Alden is known for . On March 9, 2020, a small group of Baltimore Sun reporters convened a secret meeting at the downtown Hyatt Regency. MediaNews Group came out of bankruptcy in March 2010 under the majority ownership of its lenders. Alden Global Capital, a hedge fund known for gutting local newsrooms, is seeking to buy Lee Enterprises (LEE), a publicly traded company with a chain of daily newspapers and other publications . Another ex-publisher told me Freeman believed that local newspapers should be treated like any other commodity in an extractive business. To be sure, the Knight Foundation does much to help promote and sustain local news. Or to Denver, where the Posts staff was cut by two-thirds, evicted from its newsroom, and relocated to a plant in an area with poor air quality, where some employees developed breathing problems. Hedge fund Alden to buy Tribune Publishing in deal valued at $630 Reporters kept reporting, and editors kept editing, and the union kept looking for ways to put pressure on Alden. [30], Alden Global Capital includes a real estate division called Twenty Lake Holdings, which primarily buys excess real estate from newspapers. Stewart Bainum, since losing his bid for the Sun, has been quietly working on a new venture. PDF GateHouse Media Alden Global Capital Tribune Media McClatchy Lee The New York-based hedge fund Alden Global Capital - known for slashing its newspapers' budgets to extract escalated profits - won shareholder approval Friday for its $633 million bid to acquire the Tribune Publishing newspaper chain.. Hedge fund Alden's bid to buy Chicago Tribune, other papers approved by He can cite decades-old scoops and tell you whom they pissed off. In the ensuing exodus, the paper lost the Metro columnist who had championed the occupants of a troubled public-housing complex, and the editor who maintained a homicide database that the police couldnt manipulate, and the photographer who had produced beautiful portraits of the states undocumented immigrants, and the investigative reporter whod helped expose the governors offshore shell companies. On the appointed afternoon, I dialed the number provided by his spokesperson and found myself talking to the most feared man in American newspapers. Earnest and unpolished, with a perpetually mussed mop of hair, Bainum presented himself as a contrast to the cutthroat capitalists at Alden. Even in the greed is good climate of the era, Randy is a polarizing character on Wall Street. Knight began selling off its Alden holdings in 2012, and got completely out in 2014. But he says the worst culprit is the hedge fund Alden Global Capital, which bought the Mercury in 2011 and has since sold the paper's building and slashed newsroom staff by about 70%. Smith & Company, a firm founded by Randall Duncan Smith, initially using the $20,000 cash prize he and his wife won on the 1968-1970 gameshow Dream House. A reporter at one of his newspapers suggested I try doorstepping Smithshowing up at his home unannounced to ask questions from the porch. Craigslist killed the Classified section, Google and Facebook swallowed up the ad market, and a procession of hapless newspaper owners failed to adapt to the digital-media age, making obsolescence inevitable. Now he was feeling the effects of their management. He took particular pride in finding novel ways to give away his family fortune, funding child-poverty initiatives in Baltimore and prenatal care for women in Liberia. [4], Alden purchased a 5.9-percent stake in Lee Enterprises in January 2020. This company that owns us now seems to still be prettyI dont even know how to put it, the editor said, according to a recording of the meeting obtained by The Atlantic. Iowa's Lee Enterprises seeks help to fight Alden's takeover bid "60 Minutes" correspondent Jon Wertheim did a strong piece that aired Sunday night about the grim state of local newspapers, in part because of how hedge funds, such as Alden Global Capital . These papers were in many cases left for dead by local families not willing to make the tough but appropriate decisions to get these news organizations to sustainability. (PDF) Extractive Imperialism in the Americas | henry veltmeyer Iowa-based Lee Enterprises asks investors to help fight off hedge fund Alden Global Capital. Alden, which has built a reputation as one of the newspaper industry's most aggressive cost-cutters, became Tribune Publishing's largest shareholder in November 2019 and owns a 31.3% stake. Alden Global Capital - Wikipedia . Tribune shareholders approve takeover by Alden Global Capital Gerry Smith. On more than one occasion, according to people I spoke with, he asked aloud, What do all these people do? According to the former executive, Freeman once suggested in a meeting that Aldens newspapers could get rid of all their full-time reporters and rely entirely on freelancers. Hedge fund Alden Global Capital, known for making deep newsroom cuts, won approval to acquire Tribune Publishing, which includes the Chicago Tribune, The Baltimore Sun and New York Daily News. Hedge fund Alden Global is buying newspaper chain Tribune Publishing Hedge fund reaches $630m deal to buy remaining Tribune Publishing Lee Enterprises rejects Alden Global Capital's unsolicited proposal When the city-hall reporter left a few months later, he picked up that beat too. Alden Global Looks to Buy Newspaper Publisher Lee Enterprises A month after he started, one of his fellow reporters left and Glidden was asked to start covering schools in addition to his other responsibilities. Lee, which owns the St. Louis Post Dispatch, the Omaha World-Herald and many other daily newspapers throughout the region, is staving off a takeover attempt by Alden Global Capital, a New-York . We dont hear from them Theyre, like, nameless, faceless people., In the months that followed, the Sun did not immediately experience the same deep staff cuts that other papers did. Heath Freeman, president of Alden Global Capital, is known for pushing big cost reductions, which he says help to save newspapers. Unless the Tribunes trajectory changes, Chicago may soon provide a grim case study. and our desire to support local newspapers over the long term." Alden said it wants to work Lee's board of . [22] The appointees to the MediaNews board were replaced by new directors representing the stockholders group led by Alden Global Capital. Smith & Company. The bid by Alden Global Capital, which already owns about 200 local newspapers, had faced resistance from Tribune staff and last-ditch competition. The Tribune Tower, the iconic former home of the Chicago Tribune, seen in Chicago, Illinois in 2015. Lee's board of directors . But as long as Alden had made back its money, the investment would be a success. If they did it right, Venetoulis said, they just might be able to line up a local, civic-minded owner for the paper. But the group that jumps out to me on the list is the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. Through it all, the owners maintained their ruthless silencespurning interview requests and declining to articulate their plans for the paper. The vulture is hungry again: Alden Global Capital wants to buy a few [2] Its managing director is Heath Freeman. Chicago-based Tribune Publishing on Tuesday announced a proposed sale to hedge fund Alden Global Capital in a deal valued at $630 million. The newspaper lost a quarter of its staff to buyouts after it was acquired by Alden Global Capital in May. But there are some clues here and there. After Brian took his own life, in 2001, Smith became a mentor and confidant to Heath, who was in college at the time of his fathers death. He writes a weekly column called Mugger that savages the citys journalists by name and frequently runs to 10,000 words. Read: What we lost when Gannett came to town. "[25], In early December, the board of Lee unanimously rejected the Alden bid, saying that the Alden proposal "grossly undervalues Lee and fails to recognize the strength of our business today. Below are highlights from his conversation with Morning Edition's A Martnez. Tuesday, 23 November 2021 07:46 PM EST. [29] This attempt also failed, as shareholders returned both directors to the Lee board despite Alden's opposition. "[21], shareholder rights plan, colloquially known as a "poison pill", "Alden Global Capital LLC NEW YORK , NY", "Company Overview of Alden Global Capital LLC", "Heath Freeman of Alden Global Capital says he wants to save local news. One conclusions even these reporters are hesitant to make is that we are all dealing within a capitalist system which has none, or few, principles to guide itself, apart from making a profit, no matter how. Since they bought their first newspapers a decade ago, no one has been more mercenary or less interested in pretending to care about their publications long-term health. Glidden, then a mild-mannered 30-year-old, had come to journalism later in life than most and was eager to prove himself. Even as Aldens portfolio grew, Freeman rarely visited his newspapers. Alden, which already owned one-third of . He had spoken on this issue before, and it was easy to see why. Alden Global Capital already had a 32% stake in Tribune Publishing, which owns famous names like the Tribune, Daily News, the Hartford Courant and others, and on Tuesday announced it would pay . Now it might be facing extinction. The editor in chief mysteriously resigned, and managers scrambled to deal with the cuts. But as an organization that believes that quality information is essential for individuals and communities to make their own bestchoices, it was disappointing that the foundation couldnt simply own up to its error in judgment when it came to Alden. But even for a group of journalists, it was tough to keep the publics attention. At the time, even savvy media insiders like Martin Langeveld wistfully predicted Alden would keep newspapers future in mind: Smith knows that the only way to win his big bet on the future of newspapers is to turn them into nimble, modern digital news enterprises.. The pitch had a certain romantic appeal to the reporters in the room. Clearly, for Smith and Freeman, chop-shopping their newspapers paid off. But a sense of fatalism permeated the work. Theres no industry that I can think of more integral to a working democracy than the local-news business, he said. In May, the Tribune was acquired by Alden Global Capital, a secretive hedge fund that has quickly, and with remarkable ease, become one of the largest newspaper operators in the country. City budgets balloon, along with corruption and dysfunction. During its five-year run with Alden, it seems quite unlikely that no one at Knight knew about the hedge funds slash-and-burn strategy for two reasons. They were very tight. Freeman has resisted elaborating on his relationship with Smith, saying simply that they were family friends before going into business together. Opinions - Help yourself. Is it ever okay to nick an idea? At the end of last month, Alden Global Capital, a notorious newspaper-owning hedge fund, sought to stake its claim on one of the last newspaper chains it hasn't yet touched: Lee Enterprises, which owns 90 publications across the country.Alden, which currently owns six percent of Lee's stock, sent an unsolicited offer to purchase the newspaper chain for $24 per share. [2] Its managing director is Heath Freeman. A more honest argument might have claimed, as some economists have, that vulture funds like Alden play a useful role in creative destruction, dismantling outmoded businesses to make room for more innovative insurgents. but sadly on a global scale there is hardly any independent news sources left currently. Alden Global Capital pushes to reshape Lee Enterprises board It was clear that they didnt care about this being a business in the future. The 5 global Trends in Journalism: 1 We've moved from a world where media organizations were gatekeepers to a world where media still creates the news agenda, but platform companies control access to audiences 2 this move to digital media generally does not generate filter bubbles Instead automated Serendipity + incidental exposure drive people . Ken Kelleher - Creative Director / Artist - LinkedIn Some publications, such as the Minneapolis Star Tribune, have developed successful long-term models that Aldens papers might try to follow. Alden, which has built a reputation as one of the newspaper industry's most aggressive cost-cutters, became Tribune Publishing's largest shareholder in November 2019 and owns a 31.3% stake. Some expressed exasperation with the staff of the Chicago Tribune, who were unable to find a single interested local buyer. [13], In response, the board of Lee Enterprises enacted a shareholder rights plan, colloquially known as a "poison pill", in order to ward off the purchase attempt. He stops talking to the press, refuses to be photographed, and rarely appears in public. Hedge fund Alden Global Capital will acquire the rest of what it does not already own of Tribune Publishing, owner of the Chicago Tribune, the New York Daily News and other local newspapers . He wrote, "Alden Global Capital has eliminated the jobs of scores of reporters and editors, and decimated journalism in cities all over the country: Denver, Boston, San Jose, Trenton, etc. "Local newspaper brands and operations are the engines that power trusted local news in communities across the United States," Heath Freeman, president of Alden Global Capital, said in a . by Magnus Shaw..An enormous advertising company (Leo Burnett) and a small creative film company (Asylum) have had a difficult couple of weeks. Knight first reported its investment in Alden in 2010, noting the fair market value of its Alden holdings was $13.4 million. The scene was somehow even grimmer than Id imagined. Yes, today, it's a newspaper without a newsroom. Tribune Publishing, publisher of the Chicago Tribune and other major newspapers, has agreed to be acquired by Alden Global Capital in a deal valued at $630 million . Hedge fund Alden Global is buying newspaper chain Tribune Publishing - CNN [32], The company has been criticized for investing money for pensions of newspaper employees in funds it manages itself. What most concerns him is how his city will manage without a robust paper keeping tabs on the people in charge. Alden Global Capital had recently purchased a nearly one-third stake in the Suns parent company, Tribune Publishing, and the firm was signaling that it would soon come for the rest. Alden is in the business of making money, not journalism. [10] With its acquisition of Tribune Publishing in late May 2021, Alden is collectively the second-largest owner of newspapers in the United States, as calculated by average daily print circulation, second only to Gannett. It has figured out how to make a profit by driving newspapers into the ground, he says, since Alden's aim is not to make them into long-term sustainable businesses but rather maximize profits quickly to show it has made a winning investment. Nov. 22, 2021. Last week, Alden Global Capital, the hedge fund notorious for slashing costs at its local titles, came down on the No side of the question, with editorial boards at papers that it owns stating that they will no longer endorse candidates for governor, US senator, or president. The Tribune Tower rises above the streets of downtown Chicago in a majestic snarl of Gothic spires and flying buttresses that were designed to exude power and prestige. You have no way of knowing that if you dont have some nosy son of a bitch asking a lot of questions down there, he told me. Alden Global Capital is buying and gutting local newspapers : NPR - NPR.org Two days after the deal was finalized, Alden announced an aggressive round of buyouts. A Secretive Hedge Fund Is Gutting Newsrooms. Some in the industry say they wouldnt be surprised if Smith and Freeman end up becoming the biggest newspaper moguls in U.S. history. They want to know who exactly profits when we learn, as Harvard Nieman Labs Ken Doctor recently reported, that the firm netted $160 million last year from its Digital First Media newspapers. Heath Freeman in an undated photo provided by Goldin Solutions . Other large shareholders include Californian asset manager Capital Group and UK fund manager Jupiter Asset Management. . I asked. It feels like were going up against capitalism now, Lillian Reed, the reporter who helped launch the Save Our Sun campaign, told me. he asks. At the time, finalternatives.com reported that the Global Distress Opportunities fund would focus on financial firms as well as homebuilding, gaming and auto-related names.. In May, The Alden Global Capital a hedge fund, acquired Tribune Publishing TPCO for $633 million. My answer is its hard to know. Alden is not a newspaper company, says Ann Marie Lipinski, a former editor in chief of the Chicago Tribune. They call Alden a vulture hedge fund, and I think thats honestly a misnomer, Johnson said. In the past 15 years, more than a quarter of American newspapers have gone out of business. The purchase represents the culmination of Alden's years-long drive to take over the company and its storied titles . I sort of bully people around to get stuff done, he boasted to The Washington Post in 1985. Alden Global Capital owns 56 dailies under Digital First Media (Alden also owns 32% of Tribune 10 dailies in Column C.) Tribune Media owns 10 dailies.

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