Knight Ridder profit declines 22% (Dinosaur Media Extinction Alert)

Marketwatch.com ^ | Jan 31, 2006 | David B. Wilkerson

[abb]

More good news for today....

[Pittsburg Phil]

"More good news for today...."

You got that right, brother. Hope this means that their leftwing rag, the Akron Beacon Journal, will be gone soon.

[Pittsburg Phil]

"More good news for today...."

You got that right, brother. Hope this means that their leftwing rag, the Akron Beacon Journal, will be gone soon.

[Lexington Green]

Propaganda masquerading as news -- it just don't sell

[OldFriend]

Boo hoo NOT

[tiki]

It must be because there are no terrorists.

Isn't it funny how they denigrate Fox News while they go broke?

[Brilliant]

Good riddance.

[A Balrog of Morgoth]

As Judge Smails might say, "Well, Mr. Unemployed Journalist Guy, the world needs ditchdiggers too."

[abb]

The WSJ's version of the story...

Knight Ridder's Net Falls 22%
By JOSEPH T. HALLINAN
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
January 31, 2006 1:01 p.m.

Knight Ridder Inc., which put itself up for sale in November, reported that fourth-quarter net income fell 22% on flat revenue.

Profit for the quarter was $83.3 million, or $1.24 a share, down from $107.2 million, or $1.38 a share, a year earlier. Revenue rose 3.1% to $819.9 million.

Shares fell in afternoon trading, down $1.42, or 2.2%, at $62.03, on the New York Stock Exchange.

The company's results were muddied by newspaper swaps and sales earlier in the year. On Aug. 29 Knight Ridder acquired three newspapers in the western U.S. in exchange for a paper in Tallahassee, Fla., and cash. It also sold its Detroit newspaper operations to Gannett Co. Results for the three acquired papers are included in the fourth-quarter results.

For the year ended Dec. 25, Knight Ridder earned $471.4 million, $6.52 a share. That includes $2.87 a share from gains on the sale of Detroit and Tallahassee. In 2004, it earned $326.2 million, or $4.13 a share, including 35 cents a share from the reclassification of Detroit and Tallahassee as discontinued operations.

San Jose-based Knight Ridder is the nation's second-largest newspaper chain by circulation, with 32 daily papers, including the Philadelphia Inquirer and the Miami Herald. The company was forced to put itself up for sale last fall after its largest shareholder urged the company to evaluate its "strategic alternatives." The company said costs associated with this evaluation amounted to four cents per diluted share in the quarter.

In a statement, company Chairman and CEO Tony Ridder said the company's online ventures were growing, with revenue at Knight Ridder Digital up 55.4% for the quarter, to $45.5 million.

But its print products haven't done so well. Big markets continued to fare worse than smaller ones. Total ad revenue in Knight Ridder's top nine markets, including Philadelphia and Kansas City, fell 1.6% for the quarter; the mid-sized and smaller markets were up 2.3%. For the year, the company said, ad revenue in large markets inched up only 0.4%; in small and mid-size markets, it rose 4.3%.

Circulation continued to decline in the fourth quarter, down 4.1% daily and 4.3% Sunday. The company said price increases in some markets contributed to the decline. For the full year, circulation declined 3.1% daily and 3.3% Sunday. The company's results were boosted by a share repurchase. During the quarter Knight Ridder bought back 857,000 of its shares. Total repurchases for the year were 10.4 million, bringing total shares outstanding at the end of the year to 66.9 million.

Write to Joseph T. Hallinan at joseph.hallinan@wsj.com

[Hermann the Cherusker]

A 10% profit doesn't look bad.

[trebb]

I hate what Knight-Ridder did to the Biloxi Sun Herald when they bought it...

[golas1964]

I've emailed DIRECTV and the FCC in support of the 'A La Carte' cable/satellite subscription concept. I don't think I should be forced to pay for cable channels I don't watch. I don't wish to subsidize CNN, MTV, etc. any more. I believe this is a good way to defund the MSM.

Link to FCC 'A La Carte' comment form:
http://gullfoss2.fcc.gov/ecfs/Upload?hot_docket=1009000877%7C04-207%7CCable+and+Satellite+subscriber+options%2C+e.g.+a+la+carte+channels&Send=Continue

[Kokojmudd]

[msnimje]

When Hayden gave his great speech about the NSA terrorist surveillance program he gave a great slap down to a very ignorant Knight Ridder Reporter.

The reporter was making false claims, in a very angry tone mind you, about the text of the fourth amendment.
It was fantastic!

[bert]

....The company's results were muddied by newspaper swaps and sales earlier in the year....

To me this is the key and the rest is misleading. To say profits are down comparatively with the same quarter and not go deeper is bad reporting. One would expect revenues and resultin profits to decline is major pieces of the business are sold. The question is how is the return on capital now? up or down?

[Spirited]

Good.

[DJtex]

Bill Gates talked about companies in a "death spiral" where they can't pull out and reinvent themselves in time. That's because it's much easier to grow fast than it is to shrink fast. If a company has invested in new buildings and capital equipment for years and years, it's quite hard to divest those fixed expenses and to change the culture to a smaller, leaner organization.

Hence, the image of dinosaurs bogged down in a tar pit.

[ncountylee]

Great news!

[PAR35]

Does the 'excerpt and link only' list need to be updated to reflect that the Tallahassee Democrat is now Gannett (the Detroit paper seems to already be on the Gannett list) and that the the (Boise) Idaho Statesman, the (Olympia, Wash.) Olympian and the Bellingham (Wash.) Herald are not, or do you need to wait until you get something 'official' from the companies?

[PAR35]

Thanks for that link.