what newspapers does alden global capital own

Alden began its acquisition of Tribune Publishing in 2019, when they paid $117.9 million to Michael Ferro for his 25.2-percent stake. 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, in a . hide caption. 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 . So why be surprised that Knight-Ridder or anyone else is investing in destructive but profitable ventures? . Another ex-publisher told me Freeman believed that local newspapers should be treated like any other commodity in an extractive business. By the charitys own accounting, it lost $ 2.3 million in book value on a $17 million investment that year. On . 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. Ken Kelleher is an American sculptor. He started as a general-assignment reporter, covering local crime and community events. Youd be surprised. Shares of Lee Enterprises Inc. rose sharply Monday after hedge fund Alden Global Capital LLC offered to buy the newspaper publisher for about $141 million. "[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. The rationale offered by the board was, Consistent with its fiduciary duties, Lees Board has taken this action to ensure our shareholders receive fair treatment, full transparency and protection in connection with Aldens unsolicited proposal to acquire Lee. It was founded in 2007 by Randall D. The new owners had announced a round of buyouts, some beloved staffers were leaving, and those who remained were worried about the future. Longtime Tribune staffers had seen their share of bad corporate overlords, but this felt more calculated, more sinister. The most promising prospect materialized in Baltimore, where a hotel magnate named Stewart Bainum Jr. expressed interest in the Sun. He told me it will begin with an annual operating budget of $15 million, unprecedented for an outfit of this kind. Instead, they gutted the place. Some people believe that local newspapers will eventually be replaced by new publications, which Coppins describes as "built from the ground-up for the digital era." For Baltimore to avoid a similar fate, Simon told me, something new would have to come alonga spiritual heir to the Sun: A newspaper is its contents and the people who make it. He studied art at Alfred University under sculptors Glenn Zweygardt and William Parry. When the sale failed to attract a sufficiently high offer, Freeman turned his attention to squeezing as much cash out of the newspapers as possible. Freeman was clearly aware of his reputation for ruthlessness, but he seemed to regard Aldens commitment to cost-cutting as a badge of honorthe thing that distinguished him from the saps and cowards who made up Americas previous generation of newspaper owners. Freeman was more animated when he turned to the prospect of extracting money from Big Tech. It felt important. The firm has a history of purchasing newspapers to cut costs wherever . By the 1980s, this strategy has made Randy luxuriously wealthyvacations in the French Riviera, a family compound outside New York Cityand he has begun to school his children on the wonders of capitalism. The specific shareholder rights plan adopted by the Lee board forbids Alden from purchasing more than 10% of the company, and will be in force for one year. Since Alden's . Gerry Smith. 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. This is a subscription-based business.. [32], The company has been criticized for investing money for pensions of newspaper employees in funds it manages itself. Alden-owned newspapers have cut their staff at twice the rate of their competitors, for all of Tribune Publishings newspapers, security company that trained Saudi operatives. Newspapers Affect Us, Often In Ways We Don't Realize, 'Project Mayhem': Reporters Race To Save Tribune Papers From 'Vulture' Fund. With its acquisition of Tribune Publishing earlier this year, Alden now controls more than 200 newspapers, including some of the countrys most famous and influential: the Chicago Tribune, The Baltimore Sun, the New York Daily News. A reporter at one of his newspapers suggested I try doorstepping Smithshowing up at his home unannounced to ask questions from the porch. 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. Unless the Tribunes trajectory changes, Chicago may soon provide a grim case study. 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. Alden, a New York City-based firm that has become the grim reaper of American newspapers, had recently increased its stake in Tribune Publishing to 32%making it the largest shareholder of the . Freeman would show up at business meetings straight from the gym, clad in athleisure, the executive recalled, and would find excuses to invoke his college-football heroics, saying things like When I played football at Duke, I learned some lessons about leadership. (Freeman was a walk-on placekicker on a team that won no games the year he played.). 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. [31], In 2019, Twenty Lake Holdings reported that it had acquired about 180 properties with 2.3 million square feet of real estate in 29 states. With his own money, he helps his brother launch the New York Press, a free alt-weekly in Manhattan. The newspaper lost a quarter of its staff to buyouts after it was acquired by Alden Global Capital in May. Margaret Sullivan: The Constitution doesnt work without local news. In its bid to acquire Tribune Publishing, the hedge fund Alden Global Capital vowed to provide $375 million in cash to the owner of the Chicago Tribune, the Baltimore Sun and other titles a . [2] Its managing director is Heath Freeman. So Freeman pivoted. At the same time, he increased subscription prices in many markets; it would take awhile for subscribersmany of them older loyalists who didnt carefully track their billsto notice that they were paying more for a worse product. Even as Aldens portfolio grew, Freeman rarely visited his newspapers. I asked Knight about those investments and whether the Foundations officers had any regrets, knowing what we now do about Aldens devastating effect on its own newspapers. He scores big with a bankrupt aerospace manufacturer, and again with a Dallas-based drilling company. 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, in a . But for that to happen, the Big Tech money would need to flow to underfunded newsrooms, not into the pockets of Aldens investors. A spokesman took issue with the entirety of the story, and laid out a long list of questions attacking the integrity of the reporter, The Atlantic and some of his sources without addressing some of the more specific claims within the report. Rapid-fire changes underway at newspapers sold to cost-slashing hedge fund Alden Global Capital have led to a profound case of the jitters at newsrooms like the New York Daily News. 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. Alden Global Capital revealed a proposal Monday to purchase Lee Enterprise Inc. and its newspapers at $24 a share, casting alarm through the many newsrooms owned by Lee. 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. It has filed a lawsuit in its bid to buy out news publisher Lee Enterprises. Send any friend a story As a subscriber, you . Alden, which owns more than 200 newspapers across the country, has developed a reputation for using extensive layoffs and severe cost cuts at the newspapers it owns. The largest share of the blame was assigned to the Tribune board for allowing the sale to Alden to go through. Hes impressed by their journalism, he told me, but his clearest takeaway is that theyre not nearly well funded enough. That might sound like a losing formula, but these papers dont have to become sustainable businesses for Smith and Freeman to make money. Now it might be facing extinction. They want to know who exactly profits when we learn, as Harvard Nieman Lab's Ken Doctor recently reported, that the firm netted $160 million last year from its Digital First Media . Freemans father, Brian, was a successful investment banker who specialized in making deals on behalf of labor unions. But while its true that Alden entered the industry by purchasing floundering newspapers, not all of them were necessarily doomed to liquidation. On the surface, the answer might seem obvious. Coppins offers several examples, like the Chicago Tribune and California's Vallejo Times-Herald. Freeman was only slightly more accessible. It will rely initially on philanthropic donations, but he aims to sell enough subscriptions to make it self-sustaining within five years. He was fired after criticizing Alden in a Washington Post interview. Even in the greed is good climate of the era, Randy is a polarizing character on Wall Street. If you want to know what its like when Alden Capital buys your local newspaper, you could look to Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, where coverage of local elections in more than a dozen communities falls to a single reporter working out of his attic and emailing questionnaires to candidates. 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. 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. There were sober op-eds and lamentations on Twitter and expressions of disappointment by professors of journalism. This was the core of Freemans argument. It seemed reasonable to ask that they answer a few questions. [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. 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 about $141 million. It's newspaper-endorsement season again, and that means it's Should newspapers do endorsements?season again. One tagline he was considering was Marylands Best Newsroom., When I asked, half in jest, if he planned to raid the Sun to staff up, he responded with a muted grin. "A lot of cities almost operate with the assumption that there will be at least one local newspaper, in some cases several local newspapers, acting as a check on the authorities," he says. Freeman, his 41-year-old protg and the president of the firm, would be unrecognizable in most of the newsrooms he owns. The men killing Americas newspapers, how Slack upended the workplace, and the new meth. "And what we've seen in a lot of these places where newspapers have been scaled back or even closed is there really is no comparable product in place, whether it's by the government or by another news organization, to do what these local newspapers have done for hundreds of years.". 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 . He declined to meet me in person or to appear on Zoom. Several interim executive positions were also filled by people related to Alden or its parent, Smith Management LLC.[23]. When hed agreed to the interview, Id expected him to say the things he was supposed to saythat the layoffs and buyouts were necessary but tragic; that he held local journalism in the highest esteem; that he felt a sacred responsibility to steer these newspapers toward a robust future. It wasn't the first newspaper acquisition for this hedge fund firm, nor is it the only firm of its kind eyeing the nation's newspapers. Maybe theyd cancel their subscriptions eventually; maybe the papers would fold altogether. Who Profits From Alden Global Capital? [4] [5] The company added more newspapers to its portfolio in May 2021 when it purchased Tribune . My request for an interview with Smith was dismissed by his spokesperson before I finished asking. Meanwhile, with few newsroom jobs left to eliminate, Alden continued to find creative ways to cut costs. NPR reached out to Alden for a response. In May 2021, Tribune Publishing finalized its sale to Alden, after having announced in February 2021 that it intended to pursue this path. On Monday, Dail Several years later, when Heath was still in his mid-20s, Smith co-founded Alden Global Capital with him, and eventually put him in charge of the firm. [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. Iowa-based Lee Enterprises asks investors to help fight off hedge fund Alden Global Capital. Convinced that the Sun wont be able to provide the kind of coverage the city needs, he has set out to build a new publication of record from the ground up. Theres little evidence that Alden cares about the sustainability of its newspapers. It turned out that those ownersNew York hedge funders whom Glidden took to calling the lizard peoplewere laser-focused on increasing the papers profit margins. What happens next? Three days later, Bainumstill smarting from his experience with Alden, but worried about the Suns fatesent a pride-swallowing email to Freeman. When a reporter asked if their work was still valued, the editor sounded deflated. With aggressive cost-cutting, Alden can operate its newspapers at a profit for years while turning out a steadily worse product, indifferent to the subscribers its alienating. 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. 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. Read: Local news is dying, and Americans have no idea, From 2015 to 2017, he presided over staff reductions of 36 percent across Aldens newspapers, according to an analysis by the NewsGuild (a union that also represents employees of The Atlantic). Around this time, Randy becomes preoccupied with privacy. This all seemed especially relevant considering many Alden/DFM papers were previously part of the Knight-Ridder chain, the family news empire from which the foundation sprang. It . Layout design was outsourced to freelancers in the Philippines. Newspaper publisher Lee Enterprises is asking its shareholders to help it fight off a hostile takeover . [27] The Alden lawsuit asserts that the members of the Lee board "have every reason to maintain the status quo and their lucrative corporate positions" and that they are "focused more on [their] own power than what's best for the company. Media . While some finance reporters noted that Smiths newspaper investments were all losing value, none seemed to notice that Smith and Aldens president Heath Freeman would soon start strip mining their news companies real estate and other assets. One, the warning shot was fired in 2011, in a Poynter Institute article titled Who is investor Randall Smith and why is he buying up newspaper companies? Randall Smith is the co-founder of Alden, together with his young protg, Heath Freeman, and has been called the grandfather of vulture investing. Vulture funds by definition dont reinvest in their properties they suck them dry. In Orlando, the Sentinel ran an editorial pleading with the community to deliver us from Alden and comparing the hedge fund to a biblical plague of locusts. In Allentown, Pennsylvania, reporters held reader forums where they tried to instill a sense of urgency about the threat Alden posed to The Morning Call. Misinformation proliferates. The audio for this interview was produced by Ryan Benk and edited by Scott Saloway. "[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. "[28], In mid-February 2022, the Delaware court found in favor of Lee Enterprises. "[34], In October 2021, The Atlantic examined the impact of Alden's acquisition of the Chicago Tribune, noting that, "The new owners did not fly to Chicago to address the staff, nor did they bother with paeans to the vital civic role of journalism. Maybe this obscure hedge fund had a plan. In a press release Monday, Nov. 22, 2021 Alden said it sent Lee's board a letter with the offer. In conversations with former Alden employees, I heard repeatedly that their partnership seemed to transcend business. In 2011, Paton launched an ambitious initiative he called Project Thunderdome, hiring more than 50 journalists in New York and strategically deploying them to supplement short-staffed local newsrooms. 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. If Knights total divestment from Alden in 2014 was because someone made an ethical decision to stop dealing with the vulture fund, good for them. Some of these papers likely would have been liquidated if the fund had not stepped in to buy them, as Alden's president told Coppins. But in the meantime, there isn't really anything that can fill the hole these newspapers will leave if they're shut down. In my many conversations with people who have worked with Freeman, not one could recall seeing him read a newspaper. Spend some time around the shell-shocked journalists at the Tribune these days, and youll hear the same question over and over: How did it come to this? 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.

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