levy, I wonder if Knight Ridder is throwing in with General Uncle Paully and the the grades, rank and file of Go2Neters at STRIKE COMMAND CENTRAL.
biz.yahoo.com
Thursday January 25, 3:01 pm Eastern Time
Knight Ridder Posts Loss
SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) -- Knight Ridder, the nation's second-largest newspaper publisher, reported a net loss of $18.9 million for the fourth quarter on charges for writing down the value of investments in several Internet companies.
The net loss for Knight Ridder, which publishes The Miami Herald, the San Jose Mercury News and 30 other daily newspapers, was equivalent to 29 cents a share, the company said Wednesday.
Without the one-time charges, Knight Ridder posted operating income of $188.8 million, or $1.09 a share, compared with $1.03 a share in the year-ago period. Analysts surveyed by First Call/Thomson Financial were expecting $1.07 a share.
The company took a pre-tax charge of $168 million to write down the value of its investments in Internet companies such as InfoSpace Inc. [NasdaqNM:INSP - news], GoTo.com Inc. (NasdaqNM:GOTO - news) and Webvan Group Inc. Knight Ridder also posted a pre-tax charge of $17.2 million for severance costs, related to the company's decision in December to cut 440 jobs, or 2 percent of its work force.
Revenue rose 7.3 percent to $877.8 million in the quarter, which was one week longer than the fourth quarter of 1999. Of that total, $690.8 million came from advertising.
Knight Ridder also reported that earnings from its stake in the Seattle Times dropped about 50 percent to $11.4 million due to a seven-week strike at the newspaper in late 2000.
For all of 2000, net income excluding one-time charges was $329.4 million, or $3.70 a share, up from $3.30 a share in 1999. Revenue rose 5.9 percent to $3.2 billion.
``For the fifth year in a row, we are reporting record earnings per share,'' chairman and CEO Tony Ridder said. ``All of this was accomplished amid the challenges of rising newsprint prices and a softening revenue growth environment -- which underscores, once again, the commitment of our management to tight cost discipline.''
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