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Prior to the buildings completion, McCormick directed his foreign correspondents to collect fragments of various historical sitesa brick from the Great Wall of China, an emblem from St. Peters Basilicaand send them back to be embedded in the towers facade. 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. That might sound like a losing formula, but these papers dont have to become sustainable businesses for Smith and Freeman to make money. 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 . It was founded in 2007 by Randall D. 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. But we dont know, because they arent saying. Its a hedge that went and bought up some titles that it milks for cash.. Alden began its acquisition of Tribune Publishing in 2019, when they paid $117.9 million to Michael Ferro for his 25.2-percent stake. 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. On Monday, Dail 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. In the for-profit news arena, Knight is spurring the digital transformation of local newsrooms through the Knight-Lenfest Newsroom Initiative, Sherry said. Year after year, the executives from Alden would order new budget cuts, and Glidden would end up with fewer co-workers and more work. At one point, he told me, the citys entire civil-service commission was abruptly fired without explanation; his sources told him something fishy was going on, but he knew hed never be able to run down the story. Pioneer Press owner buys 11 more Minnesota papers - Star Tribune Lee Enterprises rejects Alden Global Capital's unsolicited proposal Research shows that when local newspapers disappear or are dramatically gutted, communities tend to see lower voter turnout, increased polarization, a general erosion of civic engagement and an environment in which misinformation and conspiracy theories can spread more easily. What threatens local newspapers now is not just digital disruption or abstract market forces. 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. Iowa-based Lee Enterprises asks investors to help fight off hedge fund Alden Global Capital. Baltimore has always had its problems, he told me. 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. Bainum told me hed come to appreciate local journalism in the 1970s while serving in the Maryland state legislature. Joe Pompeo pilloried Alden in Vanity Fair for reducing newsrooms. Heath Freeman in an undated photo provided by Goldin Solutions . With full control of Tribune Publishing, Alden Global Capital is scrambling to squeeze out a return on its $600 million investment in the struggling Chicago-based newspaper company. 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 . 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. In addition to the constant layoffs, our buildings were being sold, basic office supplies became scarce and the hot water stopped working. He says he visited the Tribune's office and was "really shocked by how grim the scene was." Alden Global Capital makes offer for Lee Enterprises, owner of Winston Alden, which already owned one-third of . Alden Global Capital seeks to buy Lee Enterprises for $144M The Tribune Tower, the iconic former home of the Chicago Tribune, seen in Chicago, Illinois in 2015. 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. Hedge fund Alden's bid for owner of Virginian-Pilot, Daily Press The California Public Employees Retirement System, a few European banks, and Citigroup and Coca Cola Companys pension funds have all invested in Alden, along with charities such as the Circle of Service Foundation and the Alfred University Endowment. When the city-hall reporter left a few months later, he picked up that beat too. Tuesday, 23 November 2021 07:46 PM EST. In my many conversations with people who have worked with Freeman, not one could recall seeing him read a newspaper. But even for a group of journalists, it was tough to keep the publics attention. Some publications, such as the Minneapolis Star Tribune, have developed successful long-term models that Aldens papers might try to follow. In budget meetings, according to the former executive, Freeman hectored local publishers, demanding that they produce detailed numbers off the top of their head and then humiliating them when they couldnt. 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. Knight first reported its investment in Alden in 2010, noting the fair market value of its Alden holdings was $13.4 million. Since Alden's . New York hedge fund and U.S. newspaper consolidator Alden Global Capital LLC has made a proposal to take Lee Enterprises Inc. private in a deal that values the company at around $141 million. Margaret Sullivan: The Constitution doesnt work without local news. 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. 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. But as long as Alden had made back its money, the investment would be a success. They had a father-figure relationship, one told me. It financed the deal with the help of Cerberusa private-equity firm that owned, among other businesses, the security company that trained Saudi operatives who participated in the murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi. qhhsubiquity.com Informacin detallada del sitio web y la empresa It's traded in a prestigious downtown newsroom for a "Chipotle-sized office" near the printing press. But for Simon, that paper exists entirely in the past. [2] Its managing director is Heath Freeman. [21], Under the acquisition plan, MediaNews Group debt fell to $165 million from about $930 million. 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 . By 2011, when Aldens Distressed Opportunities Fund lost more than 20 percent of its value, Knights holdings in the fund were valued at $10.7 million. Some in the industry say they wouldnt be surprised if Smith and Freeman end up becoming the biggest newspaper moguls in U.S. history. If they did it right, Venetoulis said, they just might be able to line up a local, civic-minded owner for the paper. But by 2014, it was becoming clear to Aldens executives that Patons approach would be difficult to monetize in the short term, according to people familiar with the firms thinking. Its hard to imagine theyd show, anyway. So I was more than a little shocked to learn that, according to its tax filings, Knight had invested $13 million with Aldens Distressed Opportunities Fund by 2010 and kept investing through 2014. After all, it has a long and venerable history of supporting local news. Alden Global Capital pushes to reshape Lee Enterprises board The editor in chief mysteriously resigned, and managers scrambled to deal with the cuts. 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. My answer is its hard to know. 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. The audio for this interview was produced by Ryan Benk and edited by Scott Saloway. It was all about the next quarters profit margins, says Matt DeRienzo, who worked as a publisher for Aldens Connecticut newspapers before finally resigning. The best architects of the era were invited to submit designs; lofty quotes about the Fourth Estate were selected to adorn the lobby. It . A look at Alden Global Capital is the cover story of the latest . The shadow of hedge fund and corporate ownership leaves newsrooms in Caleb will later recall, in an interview with D Magazine, asking his dad why he works so hard. "[28], In mid-February 2022, the Delaware court found in favor of 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. Live news: US manufacturing sector contracts for fourth straight month Alden, which took Chicago-based newspaper chain Tribune Publishing private in May, said it made a proposal to buy Lee for $24 a share in cash, a 30% premium to Friday's closing price for . Well, he told me, they have some very good reporters., This article appears in the November 2021 print edition with the headline The Men Who Are Killing Americas Newspapers., A Secretive Hedge Fund Is Gutting Newsrooms, I Dont Know That I Would Even Call It Meth Anymore, W. G. Sebald Ransacked Jewish Lives for His Fictions. On . Lee blocks Alden Global Capital move for more board control - STLPR It feels like were going up against capitalism now, Lillian Reed, the reporter who helped launch the Save Our Sun campaign, told me. Today, half of all daily newspapers in the U.S. are controlled by financial firms, according to an analysis by the Financial Times, and the number is almost certain to grow. Iowa's Lee Enterprises seeks help to fight Alden's takeover bid This Is How a Newspaper Dies - POLITICO Magazine But he couldnt help feeling that the police scandal would have been exposed much sooner if the Sun were operating at full force. Alden Global Capital swallowed all of the Tribune's newspapers, including the New York Daily News, earlier in 2021. But when I emailed his studio looking for information, I was informed curtly that the photo was no longer available. Had Smith bought the rights himself? It was like watching a slow-motion disaster, says Gregory Pratt, a reporter at the Chicago Tribune. Most of his investments are defined by a cold pragmatism, but he takes a more personal interest in the media sector. Glidden, then a mild-mannered 30-year-old, had come to journalism later in life than most and was eager to prove himself. . They are also defined by an obsessive secrecy. But while its true that Alden entered the industry by purchasing floundering newspapers, not all of them were necessarily doomed to liquidation. Former Knight-Ridder headquarters. About a month after The Baltimore Sun was acquired by Alden, a senior editor at the paper took questions from anxious reporters on Zoom. 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. Vallejo deserves better. A few weeks after the story came out, he was fired. 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. When a reporter asked if their work was still valued, the editor sounded deflated. "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.". Media . He started as a general-assignment reporter, covering local crime and community events. Alden Global Capital is a hedge fund based in Manhattan, New York City. I sort of bully people around to get stuff done, he boasted to The Washington Post in 1985. No response came back. A recent Financial Times analysis found that half of all daily newspapers in the U.S. are controlled by financial firms, and Coppins says that number is all but certain to keep growing. These included several Cayman Island-based funds and another profiting from Greek debt stemming from that countrys financial crisis. The movement gained traction in some markets, with local politicians and celebrities expressing solidarity. He studied art at Alfred University under sculptors Glenn Zweygardt and William Parry. In 2016 (year of the most recent 990 available), the foundation invested $17 million in Alden funds. Hes impressed by their journalism, he told me, but his clearest takeaway is that theyre not nearly well funded enough. But whats happening in Chicago is different. These were not exactly boom times for newspapers, after allat least someone wanted to buy them. But there are some clues here and there. The papers printing was moved to a plant more than 100 miles outside town, Glidden told me, which meant that the news arriving on subscribers doorsteps each morning was often more than 24 hours old. Two days after the deal was finalized, Alden announced an aggressive round of buyouts. The story of Alden Capital begins on the set of a 1960s TV game show called Dream House. Maybe theyd cancel their subscriptions eventually; maybe the papers would fold altogether. Others pointed to Bainums financing partner, who pulled out of the deal at the 11th hour. Reinventing their papers could require years of false starts and fine-tuningand, most important, a delayed payday for Aldens investors. Probably not.. 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.. Reading these stories now has a certain horror-movie quality: You want to somehow warn the unwitting victims of whats about to happen. Prior to the acquisition of the Tribune Company, we purchased substantially all of our newspapers out of bankruptcy or close to liquidation, he told me. People who know him described Freemanwith his shellacked curls, perma-stubble, and omnipresent smirkas the archetypal Wall Street frat boy. Youd be surprised. It was clear that they didnt care about this being a business in the future. He writes a weekly column called Mugger that savages the citys journalists by name and frequently runs to 10,000 words. [30], Alden Global Capital includes a real estate division called Twenty Lake Holdings, which primarily buys excess real estate from newspapers. [2] Its managing director is Heath Freeman. When Simon called me, he was on the set of his new miniseries, We Own This City, which tells the true story of Baltimore cops who spent years running their own drug ring from inside the police department. Am I going to win against capitalism in America? Shareholders of Tribune Publishing, one of the country's largest newspaper chains, on Friday approved a takeover by hedge fund Alden Global Capital. Hellman and BNP together own 46.4 per cent of Allfunds' shares. Controversial hedge fund Alden Global wins bidding for Chicago Tribune That may well be the future of local news, he says. The men killing Americas newspapers, how Slack upended the workplace, and the new meth. So far, Alden has limited its closures primarily to weekly newspapers, but Doctor argues its only a matter of time before the firm starts shutting down its dailies as well.