Saturday, April 03, 2010
The Washington Post: Worthless
Zippo. Nada. A dead parrot. That's what The Washington Post is worth. And I don't mean figuratively, I mean literally. At least according to the logic in an article in this week's Barron's, the stock market is grossly undervaluing the Washington Post company, but only because its Kaplan test prep and education business and its television assets are worth so much. The newspapers and magazines are, as an economic matter, worthless:
I like newspapers, even the ones that spin my head around and burn my eyes with editorial tomfoolery, but no business can lose money forever. If the inevitable post-recession advertising recovery goes online, printed papers will go the way of long-playing records and dignified travel by airline.
2 Comments:
By 
Andrewdb, at
Sat Apr 03, 02:35:00 PM:
The Independent in London just sold for 1 GBP (plus debt assumption I am guessing). We should all by a national newspaper at those prices.
By Neil Sinhababu, at
Sun Apr 04, 09:59:00 AM:
Matt Yglesias has been calling the WaPo the "money-losing arm of the Kaplan Test Prep company" for a while now.
