Trouble at News Corp

Will the Wall Street Journal Fall With Murdoch?—David Frum

The New York Times reports today on the mounting investor pressure on Rupert Murdoch's NewsCorp to sell its UK newspaper division.

“Wall Street would love it even if negative news drove to a sale or separation of the newspaper group,” said Richard Greenfield, a media analyst at BTIG.

The Wall Street Journal is operated separately from the British papers. But it's hard to imagine that a post-Murdoch management team would want to continue to operate one newspaper after having sold all the rest. If the business decision is to quit the newspaper business to refocus on TV and movie entertainment, surely they'd want to quit entirely?

There would surely be buyers for the WSJ and the New York Post, Murdoch's two American papers. Bloomberg would seem the most logical WSJ buyer. Now the non-business question: How would American politics change if an ex-mayor Mike Bloomberg rather than Rupert Murdoch owned and managed the Wall Street Journal? It's an idly interesting question for those of us who don't work at the Journal, but surely an excruciatingly pressing question for the current Journal editorial board?

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David Frum

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