Rough times for the Financial Times

Posted by John Burke on July 3, 2006 at 3:24 PM

Although voted the world's best newspaper last year, the Financial Times has been struggling through rumors of its sale and a loss of 1/3 of its home market readers. As two articles in The Guardian point out, the news for FT doesn't seem to be getting any better.

Firstly, it seems that the paper will have to cut another 40 positions, some of which will be reporters, when it completes the integration of its print and online operations this fall. This could contribute to a higher profit margin for the paper, which was in the black last year for the first time in several.

On the circulation side, the free financial paper, City AM is to surpass the pinksheet's sales this year. FT sold 92,599 copies per day in Britain last month. The freesheet will soon hit the 100,000 copies-distributed mark.

What's worse, City AM claims a major demographic as its readership - the average reader is 36 and pulls in £77,OOO. If this young, well-off generation won't pay for its financial news, who will?

What if a free financial was launched in New York City. Would the Wall Street Journal suffer the same fate?

Source: The Guardian (job cuts and circulation)

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