what newspapers does alden global capital own

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. Am I going to win against capitalism in America? 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. 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. Joe Pompeo pilloried Alden in Vanity Fair for reducing newsrooms. Frustrated and worn out, Glidden broke down one day last spring when a reporter from The Washington Post called. [3] [4] With its acquisition of Tribune Publishing in late . * Edited from 'independent . 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 . 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. This investment strategy does not come without social consequences. This is predatory.. . Media . The men who devised this model are Randall Smith and Heath Freeman, the co-founders of Alden Global Capital. The newspaper lost a quarter of its staff to buyouts after it was acquired by Alden Global Capital in May. Smith, a reclusive Palm Beach septuagenarian, hasnt granted a press interview since the 1980s. G ARY MARX and David Jackson, two veteran investigative reporters at the Chicago Tribune, spent most of last year seeking potential buyers who might save their newspaper from Alden Global Capital . 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. 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). Freeman, his 41-year-old protg and the president of the firm, would be unrecognizable in most of the newsrooms he owns. In a press release Monday, Nov. 22, 2021 Alden said it sent Lee's board a letter with the offer. California biotech billionaire and Los Angeles Times owner Patrick Soon-Shiong, who owns 24%, 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. 'Vulture' Fund Alden Global, Known For Slashing Newsrooms, Buys Tribune Papers, Stop The Presses! It feels like were going up against capitalism now, Lillian Reed, the reporter who helped launch the Save Our Sun campaign, told me. Heath Freeman in an undated photo provided by Goldin Solutions . Year after year, the executives from Alden would order new budget cuts, and Glidden would end up with fewer co-workers and more work. These were not exactly boom times for newspapers, after allat least someone wanted to buy them. Through it all, the owners maintained their ruthless silencespurning interview requests and declining to articulate their plans for the paper. Freeman was only slightly more accessible. . Coppins notes that there's even some research indicating that city budgets increase as a result, because corruption and dysfunction can take hold without a newspaper to hold powerful people to account. 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. If they did it right, Venetoulis said, they just might be able to line up a local, civic-minded owner for the paper. In recent months, hes been meeting with leaders of local-news start-ups across the countryThe Texas Tribune, the Daily Memphian, The City in New Yorkand collecting best practices. 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. Inside Alden Global Capital. [2] [3] By mid-2020, Alden had stakes in roughly two hundred American newspapers. I asked if anyone there at the time was aware of Aldens vulture business strategy. Its World War II correspondent brought firsthand news of Nazi concentration camps to American readers; its editorial page had the power to make or break political careers in Maryland. ", "The most feared owner in American journalism looks set to take some of its greatest assets", "Minority shareholder sues Denver Post parent and NY hedge fund over 'breaches of fiduciary duty', "What does the Chicago Tribune sale mean for the future of newsrooms? But for all the theatrics, his marching orders were always the same: Cut more. In addition to the constant layoffs, our buildings were being sold, basic office supplies became scarce and the hot water stopped working. After serving in the Carter administrations Treasury Department, Brian became widely knownand fearedin the 80s for his hard-line negotiating style. That may well be the future of local news, he says. He had spoken on this issue before, and it was easy to see why. The Denver Post has become the face of this struggle, due to an editorial published in its own pages lashing out against owners, New York-based hedge fund Alden Global Capital. Alden is not a newspaper company, says Ann Marie Lipinski, a former editor in chief of the Chicago Tribune. Even in the greed is good climate of the era, Randy is a polarizing character on Wall Street. Vallejo deserves better. A few weeks after the story came out, he was fired. To be sure, the Knight Foundation does much to help promote and sustain local news. 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 . There were sober op-eds and lamentations on Twitter and expressions of disappointment by professors of journalism. I asked. 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. [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. That's because the fund is stepping in to buy and then gut newsrooms across the country. Like many alumni of the Sun, Simon is steeped in the papers history. A native of Vallejo, he was proud to work for his hometown paper. I knew they almost never talked to reporters, but Randall Smith and Heath Freeman were now two of the most powerful figures in the news industry, and theyd gotten there by dismantling local journalism. Eventually he was the only news reporter left on staff, charged with covering the citys police, schools, government, courts, hospitals, and businesses. 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. In the past 15 years, more than a quarter of American newspapers have gone out of business. They are also defined by an obsessive secrecy. The Tribune Tower rises above the streets of downtown Chicago in a majestic snarl of . Otherwise, youre just peeing in the ocean.. He shut down Project Thunderdome, parted ways with Paton, and placed all of Aldens newspapers on the auction block. 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. The pay was terrible and the work was not glamorous, but Glidden loved his job. We were in collective revolt, Lillian Reed, a Sun reporter who helped organize the campaign, told me. Shortly after the Tribune deal closed earlier this year, I began trying to interview the men behind Alden Capital. [8][24] Tribune Publishing publishes nine major metropolitan dailies. 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.. Iowa-based Lee Enterprises asks investors to help fight off hedge fund Alden Global Capital. The movement gained traction in some markets, with local politicians and celebrities expressing solidarity. 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 . Freemans father, Brian, was a successful investment banker who specialized in making deals on behalf of labor unions. A vulture doesnt hold a wounded animals head underwater. "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 . The practical effect of the death of local journalism is that you get what weve had, he told me, which is a halcyon time for corruption and mismanagement and basically misrule.. You could look to Oakland, California, where the East Bay Times laid off 20 people one week after the paper won a Pulitzer. 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. The Alden Global Capital . Meanwhile, with few newsroom jobs left to eliminate, Alden continued to find creative ways to cut costs. 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. This was the core of Freemans argument. It seemed reasonable to ask that they answer a few questions. Instead, they gutted the place. (Freeman denied this through a spokesperson.) Hes impressed by their journalism, he told me, but his clearest takeaway is that theyre not nearly well funded enough. Coppins offers several examples, like the Chicago Tribune and California's Vallejo Times-Herald. It emphasizes supporting the emergence of new, sustainable models for local news, through both grantmaking and research, Sherry told me, including grant programs for nonprofit news organizations. 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. He quotes H. L. Mencken, the papers crusading 20th-century columnist, on the joys of journalism: It is really the life of kings. 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 . At the time, the Sun had a bustling bureau in Annapolis, and he marveled at the reporters ability to sort the honest politicians from the political whores by exposing abuses of power. Glidden, then a mild-mannered 30-year-old, had come to journalism later in life than most and was eager to prove himself. When a local newspaper vanishes, research shows, it tends to correspond with lower voter turnout, increased polarization, and a general erosion of civic engagement. 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. 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. I asked, What is the Foundations perspective on those investments now, as news of Aldens gutting of these newspapers has come to light?. The pitch had a certain romantic appeal to the reporters in the room. Soon, Tribune-owned newsrooms across the country were kicking off similar campaigns. Feeling burned by the hedge fund, Bainum decided to make a last-minute bid for all of Tribune Publishings newspapers, pledging to line up responsible buyers in each market. Reporters kept reporting, and editors kept editing, and the union kept looking for ways to put pressure on Alden. But in the case of local news, nothing comparable is ready to replace these papers when they die. When Alden first started buying newspapers, at the tail end of the Great Recession, the industry responded with cautious optimism. And that has consequences for democracy, as journalist McKay Coppins writes in The Atlantic. Alden Global Capital is a hedge fund based in Manhattan, New York City. Meanwhile, in Vallejo, John Glidden went from covering crime and community news to holding the title of the only hard news reporter in town, filling a legal pad with tips he knew he'd never have time to pursue. How exactly Randall Smith chose Heath Freeman as his protg is a matter of speculation among those who have worked for the two of 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. 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. Now he was feeling the effects of their management. These include the Chicago Tribune, the New York Daily News, and The Baltimore Sun. Randy claims no editorial role in the Press, and his investment in the projectwhich has little chance of producing the kind of return hes accustomed tocould be chalked up to brotherly loyalty. But he has a big idea: He believes theres serious money to be made in buying troubled companies, steering them into bankruptcy, and then selling them off in parts. 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. But a sense of fatalism permeated the work. Bainum envisioned rebuilding the paperwhich, by 2020, was down to a single full-time statehouse reporteras a nonprofit. Glidden had heard rumblings about the papers owners when he first took the job, but he hadnt paid much attention. 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. With Alden in control, he believes the Sun is now a prisoner that stands little chance of escape. Aldens Distressed Opportunities Fund was launched in 2008 and saw astounding success in its first few months, showing returns of more than 30 percent a big rescue for Alden, whose investments in Russia the year before had lost more than 61 percent of their value. Reading these stories now has a certain horror-movie quality: You want to somehow warn the unwitting victims of whats about to happen. [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. The Tribune Tower, the iconic former home of the Chicago Tribune, seen in Chicago, Illinois in 2015. Below are highlights from his conversation with Morning Edition's A Martnez. 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 . 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. But within weeks, Bainum said, Alden tried to tack on a five-year licensing deal that would have cost him tens of millions more. Some in the industry say they wouldnt be surprised if Smith and Freeman end up becoming the biggest newspaper moguls in U.S. history. People who know him described Freemanwith his shellacked curls, perma-stubble, and omnipresent smirkas the archetypal Wall Street frat boy. Theres little evidence that Alden cares about the sustainability of its newspapers. 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. Alden is in the business of making money, not journalism. (Freeman has, in the past, disputed Bainums account of the negotiations.) and our desire to support local newspapers over the long term." Alden said it wants to work Lee's board of . Margaret Sullivan: The Constitution doesnt work without local news. . 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 . [21], Under the acquisition plan, MediaNews Group debt fell to $165 million from about $930 million. To industry observers, Aldens brazen model set it apart even from chains like Gannett, known for its aggressive cost-cutting. After a powerful Illinois state legislator resigned amid bribery allegations, the paper didnt have a reporter in Springfield to follow the resulting scandal. 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. Its a game, Randy explains to his son. It was founded in 2007 by Randall D. This story originally appeared on the Morning Edition live blog. Heath hopes the well never runs dry, but hes going to keep pumping until it does. , From the February 1905 issue: The confessions of a newspaper woman, The papers union hired a PR firm to launch a public-awareness campaign under the banner Save Our Sun and published a letter calling on the Tribune board to sell the paper to local owners. Stewart Bainum, since losing his bid for the Sun, has been quietly working on a new venture. Yes, today, it's a newspaper without a newsroom. 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 . 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. By the charitys own accounting, it lost $ 2.3 million in book value on a $17 million investment that year. One early article, in the trade publication Poynter, suggested that Aldens interest in the local-news business could be seen as flattering and quoted the owner of The Denver Post as saying he had enormous respect for the firm. Others pointed to Bainums financing partner, who pulled out of the deal at the 11th hour. The one central theme, the Times reports, seems to be that Smith and its web of affiliates are out, first and foremost, for themselves. If this reputation bothers Randy and his colleagues, they dont let on: For a while, according to The Village Voice, his firm proudly hangs a painting of a vulture in its lobby. Alden Global Capital has currently bid to buy all of Tribune. Tribune Publishing last month approved a $630m takeover deal with Alden Global Capital. [14], Alden has a reputation for sharply cutting costs by reducing the number of journalists working on its newspapers. 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. This once-proud publication is now owned and run by Alden Global Capital, a multibillion-dollar hedge fund with a long record of buying papers on the cheap, selling off their assets and slashing pay and jobs. | Michael Gray, WIkimedia Commons. "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.". Most of his investments are defined by a cold pragmatism, but he takes a more personal interest in the media sector. 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 happens next? 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. For Freeman and his investors to come out ahead, they didnt need to worry about the long-term health of the assetsthey just needed to maximize profits as quickly as possible. After congratulating him on closing the deal, Bainum said he was still interested in buying the Sun if Alden was willing to negotiate. Ken Kelleher is an American sculptor. When I asked Freeman what he thought was broken about the newspaper industry, he launched into a monologue that was laden with jargon and light on insightsummarizing what has been the conventional wisdom for a decade as though it were Aldens discovery. Newspapers Affect Us, Often In Ways We Don't Realize, 'Project Mayhem': Reporters Race To Save Tribune Papers From 'Vulture' Fund. And everyone knows its going to run dry.. 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. [2][3] By mid-2020, Alden had stakes in roughly two hundred American newspapers. The term vulture capitalism hasnt been invented yet, but Randy will come to be known as a pioneer in the field. The audio for this interview was produced by Ryan Benk and edited by Scott Saloway. Alden Global Capital swallowed all of the Tribune's newspapers, including the New York Daily News, earlier in 2021. 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. But I had underestimated how little Aldens founders care about their standing in the journalism world. Other records turned up from public pension funds and filings of publicly traded companies. Tips that he would never have time to investigate piled up on a legal pad he kept at his desk. "[18], Alden received critical coverage from the editorial staff at the Denver Post, who described Alden Global Capital as "vulture capitalists" after multiple staff layoffs. A look at Alden Global Capital is the cover story of the latest . 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. 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. Knight spokesman Andrew Sherry declined to answer any of those questions, saying instead, Our endowment investments support our grantmaking., We invested approximately one half of one percent of our endowment in an Alden fund between late 2009 and early 2014, he said via email. MNG Enterprises, Inc., doing business as Digital First Media and MediaNews Group, is a Denver, Colorado -based newspaper publisher owned by Alden Global Capital. "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. The families that used to own the bulk of Americas local newspapersthe Bonfilses of Denver, the Chandlers of Los Angeleswere never perfect stewards. 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. According to its 990s, Knight ended up making $185,000 over five years on its initial $13.4 million investment. 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. Alden gradually took control of the papers that would become DFM. [32], The company has been criticized for investing money for pensions of newspaper employees in funds it manages itself. [29] This attempt also failed, as shareholders returned both directors to the Lee board despite Alden's opposition. The Tribune Company (which owns the newspapers mentioned above) was still turning a profit when Alden bought it, but the hedge fund immediately offered aggressive rounds of buyouts and shrunk its newsrooms in the name of increasing profit margins. 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 . [4], Alden purchased a 5.9-percent stake in Lee Enterprises in January 2020. About a month after The Baltimore Sun was acquired by Alden, a senior editor at the paper took questions from anxious reporters on Zoom. 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. The shows premise pits two couples against each other for the chance to win a home. Freeman was more animated when he turned to the prospect of extracting money from Big Tech. 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. Smith. But it turned out that Smith had so many doorsteps16 mansions in Palm Beach alone, as of a few years ago, some of them behind gatesthat the plan proved impractical. "[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. Collectively, they control about one-half of daily newspapers in the U.S. A Secretive Hedge Fund Is Gutting Newsrooms. 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. Before our interview, Id contacted a number of Aldens reporters to find out what they would ask their boss if they ever had the chance. 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. 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. To him, its the same as oil, the publisher said. But most of them also had a stake in the communities their papers served, which meant that, if nothing else, their egos were wrapped up in putting out a respectable product. It's newspaper-endorsement season again, and that means it's Should newspapers do endorsements?season again. But that's not true for all of them. The scene was somehow even grimmer than Id imagined. The show draws from a book written by a Sun reporter, and Simon was quick to point out that the paper still has good journalists covering important stories. What most concerns him is how his city will manage without a robust paper keeping tabs on the people in charge. But the group that jumps out to me on the list is the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. The Tribune Tower, the iconic former home of the Chicago Tribune, seen in Chicago, Illinois in 2015. Freeman never responded. 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 . Instead, the money was used to finance the hedge funds other ventures. The new owners had announced a round of buyouts, some beloved staffers were leaving, and those who remained were worried about the future. He can cite decades-old scoops and tell you whom they pissed off.

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