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With Dow Jones now controlled by Rupert Murdoch and his News Corp., Pearson’s Financial Times may be threatened in Europe, said Pearson finance director Robin Freestone, during a Morgan Stanley Media, Telecoms and Technology conference.
On the other hand, it could prove an opportunity in the U.S., he said (via Reuters). Murdoch has said that he plans to make the Wall Street Journal a free site in order to increase readership and sign more advertisers; should that happen, and should the paper take a more generalist route, it will be more of a competitor to The New York Times than to the Financial Times.
“That takes the newspaper out of our space, frankly,” Freestone is quoted as saying. He did acknowledge that the level of threat depended on the amount of money Murdoch was willing to spend and in which market space he intends to spend it.
Freestone said the Financial Times’ circulation had increased following an increase in cover price, which proves that business-focused consumers do pay for quality analysis. He added that ft.com would continue to be a pay site. Recently, the paid site began to offer a certain number of stories per month for free.
News Corp. president Peter Chernin told a Scottish newspaper in late September that the company would “crush” the Financial Times following the deal with Dow Jones.
News Corp. expects to close the Dow Jones deal next month.
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