I’m returned from the shores of the Long Lake outside Waupaca, Wisconsin, where leeches abound in the muck around the water’s edges, full of writing notes and ideas, and various cheeses. I took neither phone nor computer; turned on the TV zero times; devoured books.
And then this bloodletting welcomes me home:
The Horror! Preview of ‘Wall Street Weak’ Ahead for Newspapers By Mark Fitzgerald Published: July 13, 2008 6:00 PM ET
CHICAGO Between the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac meltdowns, the collapse of airline industry market caps, the cratering of the financial sector, and arrival of $145-a-barrel oil, last week in the stock market was no fun for anybody. Lost in the general media headlines, however, was the beat-down of publicly traded newspaper companies, a sickening dive of share price in the double-digits — for some, in a single trading session. Don’t blame the media. Newspaper stocks swooning is old news.But the sector’s stock woes may get another 15 minutes of fame over the next two weeks as investors and analysts get a look at second quarter results. Bet your house: It’s not going to be a pretty picture.
[...] The roll call of collapse:
–GateHouse Media Inc.: Down 91.7%.
–Lee Enterprises Inc.: Down 84.1%.
–The McClatchy Co.: Down 82.3%.–Media General Inc.: Down 68.7%.–Gannett Co. Inc.: Down 68%.–Journal Communications Inc.: Down 65.4%.–New York Times Co.: Down 43.9%.
That’s kind of how it’s going with the newspaper industry. So far, the NYSE has kicked Journal Register Co. and Sun-Times Media Group off the Big Board because they fell below the requirement to cost at least $1 a share. with market capitalization of at least $75 million. On Friday you could buy a share of either company for less than a copy of their flagship papers. Sun-Times, which fell 10.42%, ended Friday at 43 cents a share. Journal Register shares cost just 15 cents. The publisher of the New Haven Register, the Daily Tribune in Royal Oaks, Mich., and 20 other daily newspapers has a market cap of less than $6 million.Going into Monday’s trading, GateHouse’s market cap, at $91 million, was not much higher than the NYSE’s minimum requirement.
Read the rest here.
Of course, I’ve managed to work for two of the companies listed – Sun Times News Group and GateHouse. My Mister’s at a Sun Times paper, too. Perhaps we should take a dollar or two and buy a few shares of SVN (as the Sun Times was called when it was allowed on the New York Stock Exchange) and have the fun of becoming Stockholders at a lower cost than the Sun Times’s cover price. With only one regular income right now, it’s Fun We Can Totally Afford.
And it’ll make me learn about stock, something a responsible adult ought to understand.
