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<p>Thanks David for sharing this important information. <br>
</p>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 5/29/20 10:06 a.m., David Walsh
wrote:<br>
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<ul style="margin-top:0cm" type="disc">
<li class="MsoListParagraph"
style="margin-left:0cm;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1"><span
style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Century
Schoolbook",serif">It would be good to share thoughts
on the Toronto Star sale at our CRAIC discussion<o:p></o:p></span></li>
</ul>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span
style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Century
Schoolbook",serif"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span
style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Century
Schoolbook",serif;mso-fareast-language:EN-CA">David
<br>
<br>
<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span
style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Century
Schoolbook",serif"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<h1 style="margin:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;background:white"><span
style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">Did
the Toronto Star just sell its soul for survival?</span><span
style="font-size:12.0pt"><a
href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-did-the-toronto-star-just-sell-its-soul-for-survival/"
moz-do-not-send="true">https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-did-the-toronto-star-just-sell-its-soul-for-survival/</a></span><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919"><o:p></o:p></span></h1>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">The
proposed sale of the Toronto Star to two Bay Street deal
makers should have Joseph Atkinson rolling in his grave. The
newspaper’s legendary editor and long-time controlling
shareholder did everything within his power to ensure that
the Star continued to reflect its social-justice and
welfare-state ethos beyond his death in 1948. And the
“Atkinson principles” have remained at the core of the
Toronto broadsheet’s journalistic mission ever since.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">It
is a sign, however, of the desperate times in which the
newspaper industry finds itself that Canada’s once dominant
metropolitan daily is about to be sold for a relative song
to two businessmen, one of whom has specialized in rescuing
fallen corporate giants. There were few options left for the
Star’s parent company, Torstar Corp., which was already
bleeding red ink even before the novel coronavirus pandemic
sapped what was left of its advertising revenue base.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">What
the proposed sale of Torstar for just more than $51-million
to an entity called NordStar Capital, controlled by Jordan
Bitove and Paul Rivett, really means will depend on whether
the two men are serious about ensuring the paper continues
to adhere to the Atkinson principles. Those principles would
seem to be out of sync with the deal-making, cost-cutting,
property-flipping capitalist ethos that Mr. Bitove and Mr.
Rivett have embodied in business. Both men are known to
support Conservative causes and politicians, not the small-
and capital-L ones with which the Star has always been
associated. They are free-marketeers; the Star, not so much.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">Both
men referred to the Star’s “brand” as the paper’s best
asset. Yet, I can’t think of anything more insulting to Mr.
Atkinson’s legacy, or to the journalists who seek to uphold
it, than to refer to the Star as a brand, like Tide or Nike
or Apple. The Star’s progressive values are not a marketing
tactic to attract left-leaning readers. They’re bred in the
bone.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">
-------------------------------<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span
style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Century
Schoolbook",serif"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<h1 style="margin:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;background:white"><span
style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">Torstar’s
family trust sells near market bottom -</span><span
style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919;font-weight:normal"></span><span
style="font-size:12.0pt">May 27, 2020</span><o:p></o:p></h1>
<p class="MsoNormal"><a
href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-torstars-family-trust-settles-to-sell-at-the-bottom/"
moz-do-not-send="true">https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-torstars-family-trust-settles-to-sell-at-the-bottom/</a><o:p></o:p></p>
<div
style="mso-element:para-border-div;border:none;border-bottom:solid
windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0cm 0cm 1.0pt 0cm">
<p class="MsoNormal" style="border:none;padding:0cm"><span
style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919;background:white">When
he died, Atkinson left control of the company in a
charity.
<span style="background:yellow;mso-highlight:yellow">In
1958, after the Ontario government ruled charities could
not own businesses, Atkinson’s heirs and four senior
executives set up a voting trust and bought control</span>
of the flagship Toronto Star for $25.6-million. For a
time, tight family control made Torstar a cash-generating
machine that built a regional media empire and moved into
books by acquiring Harlequin, the romance publisher the
company eventually sold to News Corp. for $455-million in
2014.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
</div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span
style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919;background:white"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b><span
style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919;background:white">Other
parts of article<o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">It
seems hard to imagine in this digital age, but Torstar Corp.
was once a multibillion-dollar media platform, coveted by
rivals, and its five controlling families boasted wealth
comparable to that of many modern tech entrepreneurs.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">Now
those five families – descendants of former Toronto Star
publisher Joseph E. Atkinson, who died in 1948, and four
former senior executives – are selling voting control in the
128-year-old company for $6-million. They spurned overtures
from Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd. four years ago at far
richer levels. Less than two decades back, their stake was
worth nearly $300-million. And in a pre-internet era,
Torstar fought on equal terms with rivals such as Rogers
Communications Inc. for control of cable networks, and the
controlling shareholders turned down lucrative takeover
offers.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">For
the second, third and fourth generations of the families,
the decision to throw in the towel was driven by the
company’s 2019 decision to suspend common share dividends.
“That was the final straw,” said entrepreneur Jordan Bitove,
who is teaming up with former Fairfax president Paul Rivett
to buy Torstar for just more than $51-million. “The numbers
were challenging, a significant investment was needed to
complete the digital transformation of the business, and
then came the dividend cut.”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">Torstar
has 9.8 million class A voting shares, almost all of which
are owned by the five families, and non-voting class B
shares. As recently as 2004, those shares were worth $30
each. Now NordStar Capital, a company controlled by Mr.
Bitove and Mr. Rivett, is buying Torstar for 63 cents a
share.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">Mr.
Honderich’s total stake in Torstar is worth $3.2-million,
according to a regulatory filing. The Honderich family and
two others in the shareholder group hold stakes of the
voting A shares that are worth a total of just over
$900,000.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">
--------------------------------<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<h1 style="margin:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;background:white"><span
style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">Toronto
Star publisher’s loss widens as coronavirus hits advertising
revenue<o:p></o:p></span></h1>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#191919;text-transform:uppercase;letter-spacing:.75pt;mso-fareast-language:EN-CA">DAVID
PADDON<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#595959;text-transform:uppercase;letter-spacing:.75pt;mso-fareast-language:EN-CA">THE
CANADIAN PRESS<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#595959;text-transform:uppercase;letter-spacing:.75pt;mso-fareast-language:EN-CA">PUBLISHED
MAY 6, 2020<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><a
href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-toronto-star-publishers-loss-widens-as-coronavirus-hits-advertising/"
moz-do-not-send="true">https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-toronto-star-publishers-loss-widens-as-coronavirus-hits-advertising/</a><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">Torstar
Corp. lost $23.5 million in the first quarter as revenue
dropped 20 per cent from the same time last year amid a
decline in advertising and flyer distribution, the print and
digital publisher said Wednesday as it released quarterly
results and held at a virtual shareholders meeting.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">The
company, which owns the Toronto Star and other newspapers,
said it has made progress on a long-term transformation of
its business toward digital publication but faces
significant pressure on revenue as businesses cut back on
advertising amid the COVID-19 pandemic.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">Torstar
chief executive John Boynton said that public interest in
the COVID-19 health crisis and economic slowdown resulted in
“a significant increase in digital traffic to our sites,
beginning in March and continuing into the second quarter.”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919">Unfortunately
for Torstar, this increased traffic has not driven digital
advertising revenues because some marketing digital giants,
which Boynton didn’t identify, have blocked the placement of
ads on any sites that even mention COVID-19 due to brand
safety concerns.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="c-article-bodytext" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919;background:yellow;mso-highlight:yellow">Torstar
in April announced 85 permanent layoffs across the
organization</span><span
style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919;background:white">.
It said Wednesday that it expects the job cuts will produce
$7 million of annualized savings from that initiative. It
has also frozen discretionary spending, for a $5 million
reduction for the full year.</span><span
style="font-family:"Georgia",serif;color:#191919"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span
style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Century
Schoolbook",serif"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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