You are currently browsing the tag archive for the ‘Guardian Media Group’ tag.
I admit it. I’m taking immense pleasure at the Guardian’s ongoing financial disaster – The Telegraph’s recent report that, On Thursday, Guardian News and Media (GNM) announced that The Guardian and its sister paper, The Observer, had lost £33m in cash terms last year after failing to staunch losses that ran to £34.4m the year before.
Noted The Telegraph:
“In May The Guardian’s average circulation was 262,937, down 12.5pc on year…Andrew Miller, the chief executive of GNM’s parent company, Guardian Media Group (GMG), warned staff in a series of meetings this week that the group could run out of cash in three to five years if he does not make radical changes, which could include up to 175 redundancies.”
Further:
“In truth, the only reason The Guardian has been able to carry on as long as it has done without making savage cuts is because it has been subsidised by large profits from Auto Trader, which is owned by [Guardian Media Group].”
Lorna Tilbian, a media analyst at Numis, said:
The Guardian is being artificially propped up by Auto Trader and they will have to change things because a good, vibrant business shouldn’t need to reinvest every penny it generates.
“The problem they’ve got is that they’re never going to get back the revenue they’ve lost from public sector advertising, circulation is on a long downward slope and they are giving away their digital content.
“I think they will have to start charging for their online content if they are to improve their finances.”
So many questions.
Would the Guardian’s rabid Israel haters who swarm like ants to the comment section of CiF at any mention of the word “Israel”, (and evidently don’t have day jobs), who make up the bulk of the online readership, pay for content?
Will Harriet Sherwood’s expense account be cut?
Will Marxists like Guardian Associate Editor Seamus Milne come to the rescue of his paper by conjuring a Soviet-style 5-year plan to solvency?
So much to mock. So little time. Please help me think this through. What are the implications of the Guardian’s financial woes?
Please comment.
What is the cause of the Guardian’s enormous financial loss?
What can they do to cut costs and increase revenue?
And, oh yeah, is Schadenfreude a sin?
The Guardian has recently been crusading against large donations from the London financial sector to the Conservative Party, describing in ominous tones the hedge fund managers who have passed millions to Tory coffers, and asking if such donations may influence the policy decisions of Prime Minster David Cameron’s Government.
Typical is a Guardian picture gallery, which portrayed, in unflattering profiles, some of the largest donors – often darkly noting their hedge fund ties.
Well, according to Guido Fawke’s Blog, it looks like the Guardian Media Group (GMG) has quite a cozy relationship with such fat cats, and indeed invested over £223 million in Hedge Funds during the height of the banking crisis, netting a cool £39 million – investments largely off shore from the UK and managed by an enormous, and highly secretive, assets management company (Cambridge Associates) whose client list includes billionaires and foreign governments.
Even more revealing, however, these funds are in addition to GMG assets held in Cayman Islands corporations where the rate of corporation tax is zero. Sources from Guido Fawke’s Blog suggest that GMG has between £300 million and £500 million held offshore. Such tax haven corporate vehicles are used to shield assets from tax.
Alan Rusbridger, Guardian’s Editor-in-Chief, by the way, sits on the Board which approved these investments – authorizing tax avoidance tactics which his paper has crusaded against, noting that such investments costs the UK billions in lost revenue.
In one Guardian expose, Brendan Barber, TUC (Trade Union Congress) general secretary, said:
“Tax avoidance is hollowing out the tax system. With the rest of us having to fill the tax gap left by Britain’s most wealthy, there is a real threat to the future of public services – especially as the recession takes its toll on normal tax flows.
The hypocrisy here is exquisite: a crusading “progressive” activist newspaper which routinely peddles in populist rhetoric about “afflicting the comfortable” and “comforting the afflicted” turns out to be quite comfortable failing to pay their fair share of taxes, thereby playing a major role in diluting the UK Treasury of funds necessary to alleviate the social problems they are always campaigning about.
I guess we can sum up the Guardian’s social mission this way: Do as I say, not as I do.
The Limousine Liberal’s defining modus operandi.
Hawkeye
Omar2
WellofSense
Medusa
The Alchemist
Louise
Tosca
Maimon
Telling the Truth
Israelinurse
Adam Levick
Margie in Tel Aviv
Guest/Cross Post
Hadar Sela
In praise of….the Guardian’s continuing decline in circulation, revenue and influence
October 23, 2011 in Comments which are off-topic, ad hominem, racist, vulgar or include threats of violence will be deleted | Tags: Guardian Media Group, Schadenfreud | by Adam Levick | 30 comments
From the Guardian’s Readers’ Editor, Chris Elliott, we’ve learned that the Guardian International Edition has bit the dust.
Writes Elliott:
Oh yes, the horror!!!
As the Telegraph’s Katherine Rushton noted recently about the Guardian group’s rapid decline, which includes a steep decrease in circulation and a pre-tax loss of £43.8m in fiscal year 2010:
What is an extreme left propaganda sheet to do?
Well, Rushton notes that there may indeed be some light at the end of the tunnel. The Guardian’s strategy for getting back their groove?
I’m sorry, but the possibility of a Guardian retail outlet simply begs for mockery. Please tell us, dear CiF Watch reader, what you think a Guardian Lifestyle Store would sell. What will the shop be callled? To whom will they give the honor of ceremonially opening their first location?
And…well, any other ideas on the nature of their five year retail plan would be greatly appreciated!
Artists rendering of Guardian Lifestyle Store opening day
Share this:
Like this: