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Category: Business

  • Amidst Bear Stearns takeover, Greenberg and Cayne criticize each other

    The animosity between Bear Stearns’s former chairman Alan Greenberg and its soon-to-be former chairman James Cayne has become painfully public.

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    As The New York Times writes today, “their sometimes tumultuous relationship has boiled over into an outright feud.”

    Greenberg claims that he warned Cayne about the dangers of the firms investment in subprime mortgages, but that Cayne refused to listen. Cayne, the Times reports, has told colleagues that he never received such advice from Greenberg.

    Now, with the pending takeover by JPMorgan, the two men’s fortunes couldn’t be headed in more different directions.

    Greenberg he sold his stock regularly before the decline. JPMorgan has invited him to remain as vice chairman emeritus. And he’s writing a memoir, a narrative that isn’t likely to favor Cayne.

    Cayne, widely blamed for Bear’s near failure, leaves the company next month. His personal wealth plummeted by $900 million with the collapse of Bear’s stock.

    “Goodness,” Greenberg commented, when Times reporter Landon Thomas Jr. mentioned Cayne’s loss in net worth. “That’s a shame.”

  • Warren Buffett Predicts More Losses but Says Worst May Be Over

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  • Robert Thomson is Heir Apparent at the Wall Street Journal

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  • The Bill Gates portfolio – beyond Microsoft

    Business manager Michael Larson has a portfolio of billions of dollars and a client list of one.

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    Larson, a former bond investor with Putnam Investments, picks stocks for Cascade Investment LLC, whose sole owner is Bill Gates.

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    Larson is known as a conservative investor who maintains a low profile. However, regulatory filings by Cascade provide a glimpse into the decisions he and his boss are making.

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    At the end of 2007, Cascade reported $4.2 billion in publicly reported securities. More than $570 million was in Berkshire Hathaway, the company headed by Gates’s good friend Warren Buffett.

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    Cascade also holds a 10.8 percent stake in GAMCO Investors, Inc., a firm led by Mario J. Gabelli. Gates and Gabelli have done business in the past. In 1999, Cascade loaned $25 million to Gabelli’s local telephone venture, the Lynch Interactive Corporation.

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    Cascade’s biggest investment was in the Canadian National Railway, with holdings worth more than $1.6 billion.

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    Other bets by Gates’s investment vehicle included the Mexican media company Grupo Televisa, the Mexican brewer Fomento Economico Mexicano and the waste-management company Republic Services.

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    Gates has invested in several energy ventures, including ethanol producer Pacific Ethanol and PNM Resources, a utility based in Albuquerque, NM. Another investment, Minnesota-based Otter Tail Corporation (NASD: OTTR), provides electric power, as well manufacturing and health services.

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    Cascade has lesser investments in two companies that have seen their stock price decline in recent months – Six Flags Inc. (NYSE: SIX) and Planetout (NASD: LBGT). PlanetOut, a publisher targeting gays and lesbians, announced earlier this month that it would sell its magazine and book divisions and focus on its online activities.

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    Cascade Investment was so-called because “Cascade” is a generic business name in the Northwest. No sense in drawing undue attention.

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    Larson, who has worked for Gates since 1994, generally stays out of the limelight. However, in a rare interview with Fortune in 1999, he said he had the best job in the world.

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    “It’s pure investing,” he said. “No marketing. Not much management. And client relations is limited to one guy.”

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  • Fisker CEO says Tesla Motors’ “lawsuit is nonsense”

    The legal battle over high-end green car technology continued on Thursday as Fisker Motors’ CEO Henrick Fisker called a lawsuit filed by Tesla Motors “nonsense.”

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    The press release issued by Fisker Automotive claimed it was Tesla Motors that “breached the arbitration agreement in its contract with Fisker by filing these meritless claims in San Mateo County court.”

    Earlier this month Tesla Motors filed a suit against Fisker Automotive, its design subsidiary and two of its top executives, Hendrick Fisker and Bernhard Koehler, alleging fraud, breach of contract and violation of a confidentiality agreement.

    Fisker Kharma
    Fisker Kharma

    Fisker said today that its Fisker Kharma, a plug-in hybrid sports coupe, would be delivered on schedule by the fourth quarter of 2009 and that it would “vigorously defend” itself against the allegations made by Tesla in the suit.

    Foreshadowing what may be its legal defense, Fisker quotes Alan Niedzwiecki, a Fisker director and president and CEO of Quantum Technologies, the designer of the plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (PHEV) technology being used in the Kharma.

    “In January of 2007 I first met Henrik Fisker. Soon thereafter, I became convinced that a strategic alliance joining together Quantum’s (PHEV) unique technology position with Fisker’s design expertise could be leveraged into a company capable of launching the first premium sports sedan for the (PHEV) segment. In August 2007 that vision became a reality with the inception of Fisker Automotive Inc., effectively combining Quantum’s (PHEV) drivetrain expertise with a remarkable design from Fisker Coachbuild LLC.”

    Kleiner Perkins has invested millions in the Fisker venture with partner Ray Lane on the Fisker board. Lane stated that he is “confident that Fisker Automotive continues to be a tremendous investment opportunity. The design innovation of Henrik Fisker combined with the hybrid drive train experience of Quantum is unique in the automotive market.”

    Henrick Fisker’s 19 years of design experience includes work on BMW E-1 electric car in 1991, the BMW Z8 and the Aston Martin V8 Vantage.

    In our earlier report we noted the tangled web of Silicon Valley bigwigs involved in the companies.

    Elon Musk, co-founder of PayPal and Zip2, is an investor and the chairman of Tesla. Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page, as well as Jeffrey Skoll, former president of eBay and executive producer of Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth, are investors in Tesla. Steve Westly, a former controller for the state of California and a former eBay exec, is a director.

    In January, Fisker announced a multimillion dollar investment by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and the appointment of Kleiner partner Ray Lane as a director at Fisker Automotive. At the time, Lane said Kleiner believed “that Fisker Automotive’s groundbreaking, forward-thinking design stands to pave the way for a greener and more efficient future.” The day following the announcement of the Kleiner investment Fisker unveiled the Fisker Kharma plug-in hybrid sports car at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit.

    The lawsuit puts Kleiner Perkins in an interesting position as an investor in both Google and Fisker. Additionally, Kleiner adviser Al Gore is a director at Google while fellow Google board members Sergey Brin and Larry Page are investors in Tesla.

  • Ebay Sues Craigslist in Stock Dispute

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  • Murdoch Close to Buying Newsday From Tribune

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  • Delta, Northwest hire power brokers to push merger

    Delta and Northwest airlines have hired high-powered lobbyists, including two former senators, to argue their case before Congress to create the world’s biggest airline.

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    The two carriers, which want to combine into a single, mega-airline called Delta to reduce costs, announced a proposed merger last week. Executives immediately went on the road to sell the idea to newspaper editorial boards and airline employees in major hubs like Atlanta, Minneapolis, Cincinnati and Salt Lake City.

    This week, flanked by high-profile lobbyists, they take their case to the nation’s capitol where they are expected to face questions from competitors, consumers and union representatives.

    Among those lined up on behalf of the airlines are two of the best-known former lawmakers in the lobbying world — Trent Lott of Mississippi, who until recently was the second highest-ranking Republican senator, and his new lobbying partner, former Democratic Sen. John Breaux of Louisiana.

    Also signed on is Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti, which boasts numerous former Capitol Hill staffers and Bush administration officials.

    Delta’s top executives told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that they have also hired R. Hewitt Pate, who ran the anti-trust division at the U.S. Justice Department from 2003 to 2005, to deal with questions from regulators. Pate now heads the “global competition” practice for the Hunton & Williams law firm.

    In addition, they have brought in leading anti-trust lawyer Donald L. Flexner of the firm Boies, Schiller & Flexner LLP. Flexner was featured as the lawyer to call “to survive life-or-death antitrust matters” in the April 2007, Inside Counsel magazine.

    The mission of the expanded team, who join Delta’s veteran in-house lobbyist Donald Yohe, is to persuade the Justice Department that the merged airlines will not be a monopoly. They are expected to argue that the two companies serve different regions.

    The House Judiciary Committee’s antitrust task force is slated to look at the proposed merger in a hearing at 10 a.m. Thursday. The Senate Judiciary subcommittee that deals with antitrust issues will examine the proposed combination in the afternoon.

    Congress has no authority to stop the merger, but committee appearances often become public forums for lawmakers who oppose or support such plans. The biggest potential threat to the deal right now is public opposition of Rep. James Oberstar, the Minnesota Democrat who chairs the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.

    Oberstar, who was largely responsible for grounding hundreds of planes this month by insisting on rigorous FAA inspections, has pledged to press the Justice Department for “vigorous scrutiny” of the plan.

  • Biogen Idec Rejects Carl Icahn Slate

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  • Mortgage crisis helped John Paulson reap $3.7 billion (Muckety)

    A bad year for homeowners meant a good year for John A. Paulson.

    Paulson, the founder and president of the hedge fund Paulson & Company, made $3.7 billion last year, according to an annual listing of the 50 most highly paid hedge fund managers.

    The list compiled by Institutional Investor’s Alpha Magazine was previewed on the magazine’s website yesterday.

    Paulson acquired his money by betting against the subprime mortgage market, using a complicated system that increased his earnings as the value of financial instruments bundling the mortgages dropped.

    In other words, as the world got poorer, Paulson got richer.

    He was by no means alone.

    The list of top managers shows four other billion-dollar earners.

    George Soros, of Soros Fund Management, made $2.9 billion last year, followed closely by the 2006 leader, James H. Simons of Renaissance Technologies at $2.8 billion.

    Philip Falcone of Harbinger Capital Partners earned $1.7 billion and Kenneth Griffin of Citadel Investment Group came away with $1.5 billion.

    The average compensation for the top 25 fund managers last year was $892 million, according to the survey.

    The report of this wealth stands in contrast to other recent news about home foreclosures, record-high oil prices and food shortages in some parts of the world.

    Even Wall Street is a little “uneasy” that some individuals are doing so well because others are doing so badly, the New York Times reported.

    “There is nothing wrong with it – it’s not illegal,” William H. Gross, the chief investment officer of the bond fund Pimco, told the newspaper. “But it’s ugly.”

    The Wall Street Journal wrote in January that Paulson had told friends he was going to increase his charitable giving to help those in need.

    In October 2007, he donated $15 million to the Center for Responsible Lending. That money was to help families about to lose their mortgages.

    “While we never made a subprime loan and are not predatory lenders, we think a lot of homeowners have been victimized,” Paulson told the Journal.

    Paulson, 52, who is not related to U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr., began his investment career at Odyssey Partners. He moved on to Bear Stearns, where he was in mergers and acquisitions. From there, he went to Gruss Partners, the investment firm.

    In 1994, Paulson started Paulson & Co. with $2 million. By the end of last year, the firm had $28 billion in assets, an increase in $22 billion from the previous year, the Times reported.

    In January of this year, Paulson & Co. made news by appointing Alan Greenspan, the former chairman of the Federal Reserve, to its advisory board.

    The appointment was panned by some. They said that Greenspan had switched sides by joining up with a company that had profited from the failure of low-interest policies that he had advocated while leading the Federal Reserve.

    ([Muckety](https://createpositivechange.org/2008/04/17/mortgage-crisis-helped-john-paulson-reap-37-billion/2212)

  • The professors of oil at ExxonMobil

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  • Ousted Sierra leaders tie suspension to Clorox criticism

    At the very least, the timing raises questions: The biggest environmental group in the U.S. expelled 27 leaders of its Florida chapter shortly after the state committee accused the Sierra Club’s national directors of betraying their principles to endorse a “green” cleaning line by the Clorox Company.

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    Sierra Club spokesman David Willett denied the suspensions had anything to do with disagreements over the group’s partnership with the Oakland-based Clorox. He said the four-year expulsion, which took effect last week, was the last in a series of steps taken to end bitter infighting that had undermined the Florida group’s work.

    Willett noted another state chapter, Massachusetts, had also criticized the Sierra Club’s decision to endorse the new biodegradable cleaning line, “and no action has been taken against them, and there won’t be. That’s not how the Sierra Club works.”

    First announced in January, the unprecedented partnership between the Sierra Club and Clorox has been hailed by supporters as a way to promote a green marketplace, and denounced by critics as a sell-out to a company most closely associated with Clorox Bleach. Under the deal, the Sierra Club gets an undisclosed percentage of profits from the sale of the new line, marketed under the name Green Works, in exchange for the use of its logo.

    At least some ousted activists don’t buy the assertion that their suspension is unrelated to their criticism. Joy Towles Ezell, former chairwoman of the Florida chapter, told the Guardian that the same weekend in January that the chapter passed a measure condemning the deal, they were told of their impending removal.

    She said that the new Clorox products should be named “Money Works” or “Toxic Works.”

    “Clorox is the bad guy to me,” Ezell said. “. . .You sell your soul when you get involved with something like that.”

    Sierra Club Executive Director Carl Pope admits he was skeptical when first approached by Clorox. But after reviewing the ingredients of the cleaners, most of which are plant products, and contemplating Clorox’s market reach, he decided to take the gamble.

    “One of the reasons green home cleaning products haven’t achieved much market penetration is if they came from an environmental brand, people had the sense they won’t work … And if it came from someone with a cleaning reputation the reaction was: They can’t be green.”

    Green Works may be an even bigger gamble for Clorox’s new CEO Donald Knauss, who came from Cola Cola in 2006, and who has pushed the company to launch its first new product line in 20 years. Knauss has identified sustainability as one of three core consumer trends with which he wanted to align Clorox products, and hired “green” consultants, who led him to the Sierra Club.

    Green consultant Joel Makower, who worked on the project, calls the launch a watershed:

    It’s an intriguing moment. Green Works enters the marketplace with a near perfect storm of market conditions: growing mainstream consumer demand for green products that don’t require compromise or sacrifice; significant interest from Wal-Mart and other big retailers in pushing greener products to the masses; a product that seems competitive with the leading green brands; and endorsement from Big Green.

    Naysayers, however, predict the endorsement will undermine the credibility of the environmental group, noting that a month before the deal was signed, Clorox was fined $95,000 by the Environmental Protection Agency for donating a mislabeled Chinese version of Clorox bleach to a Los Angeles charity.

    “The Sierra Club has become little more than another corporate front group,”
    said Tim Hermach of Native Forest Council in Eugene, Oregon in a piece in Corporate Crime Reporter.

    Hermach had special animus for the group’s executive director: “Carl Pope has sold out the Sierra Club’s mission of saving nature and now seems proud of his role as an obsequious and professional Uriah Heep. As a result, Sierra Club is getting lots of corporate appreciation, cash and favors.”

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  • Cayne, Macklowe keep their condos at The Plaza

    Another way the rich are different: They don’t have to pay mortgages.

    A case in point: Days before Bear Stearns chairman James Cayne suffered a dizzying $900-million loss in wealth as a result of the fire sale of Bear Stearns, he purchased two apartments in the storied Plaza for a cool $28 million.

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    But not to worry: Cayne, a onetime scrap-iron salesman and recently retired Bear Stearns chief, bought the adjacent apartments overlooking Central Park with cash, according to city records.

    The 1907 landmark, famous as the home of children’s book heroine Eloise, recently reopened as a mix of luxury condos and hotel units. The development boasts a Who’s Who of corporate chieftains, including New England Patriots boss Robert K. Kraft, Staples Chief Executive Ronald Sargent, Italian racing mogul Flavio Briatore and Dave Barger, chief executive of JetBlue.

    Like Cayne, several have been socked by recent gyrations in the real estate and financial markets. Real-estate mogul Harry Macklowe, who spent $60 million last year to buy up a string of adjacent apartments, is facing a mountain of debt himself as a result of a $7 billion, seven-building buy last year. To stave off cash-hungry creditors, he has been trying to unload the iconic General Motors building, and the office tower at 1301 Avenue of the Americas. So far, though, he’s shown no sign of giving up his dream of a palace on the park.

    Italian businessman Luigi Zunino, meanwhile, is trying to flip the third-floor apartment which he is in contract to buy, according to the Wall Street Journal. Zunino is the CEO of a Milan-based real estate company that lost three-quarters of its value in the last year. While most condos in The Plaza have been selling for between $4,000 and $6,000 per square foot, Zunino is valuing his apartment at $10,000 per square foot.

    If he gets his $100-million asking price, it would set a record for residential real estate in Manhattan. If not, maybe he can start a support group for onetime Masters of the Universe in the Oak Room.

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  • Sweet Home Deal for Qwest Ceo Ed Mueller

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  • Food World Says Goodbye to Egg Mcmuffin Creator

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  • Another mogul mulls Newsday bid

    A fourth suitor may join the bidding war over Newsday, the suburban tabloid put on the auction block by the financially-beleaguered Tribune Company.

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    Jared Kushner, boy publisher of the New York Observer, and son of New Jersey real-estate mogul Charles Kushner, is inquiring about the Long Island-based newspaper, according to today’s Wall Street Journal.

    Among New York media moguls, the 27-year-old may be considered an upstart, but he has deep pockets. In July, 2006, he spent $10 million to buy the money-losing Observer while still getting his MBA at New York University, telling the New York Times that the opportunity to buy a newspaper doesn’t come along very often.

    Kushner joins a field of giants who are eyeing the still-profitable tabloid, including billionaire magnate Rupert Murdoch, publisher of the New York Post, real-estate developer Mortimer Zuckerman, owner of the New York Daily News and James Dolan, whose family owns Cablevision.

    The magic number sought for Newsday is upwards of $500 million, as Tribune Chairman Sam Zell struggles to stay afloat after his highly leveraged purchase of the company last year. Besides Newsday, Tribune owns the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune and the Baltimore Sun, among other newspapers, as well as local television stations and the Chicago Cubs baseball team.

    Kushner, a grandson of Holocaust survivors, is the scion of a real-estate, banking and insurance empire valued at more than $1 billion built by his father Charles. But the elder Kushner suffered a spectacular fall from grace several years ago. He spent nearly a year in jail after pleading guilty to 18 counts of tax evasion, admitting, among other things, to hiring a prostitute to seduce his brother-in-law and sending a videotape of the encounter to his sister to retaliate for her cooperation with federal investigators.

    Jared Kushner is the only one of his parents’ four children to work at the family company, where he is a principal.

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    • #1.   Obama 08 04.03.2008

      If Kushner was so smart, why did he buy a newspaper when he could have started one from scratch? Why stick yourself with a teetering brand, when now is the time to invent one’s brand anew in this brave new world of new media, particularly if you have a billion bucks to cover early mistakes?

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  • Sam Nunn should share Chevron’s hot seat

    Congress grilled oil company executives Tuesday about runaway energy costs and record profits. For Chevron, there was some irony. Former U.S. Senator Sam Nunn, a Georgia Democrat, is a member of Chevron’s board of directors.

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    “On April Fool’s Day, the biggest joke of all is being played on American families by Big Oil,” Rep. Edward Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, said during a House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing on Capitol Hill.

    Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice is a former Chevron board member.

    Testifying in Washington were executives Stephen Simon of Exxon Mobil, John Hofmeister of Shell Oil, Peter Robertson of Chevron, John Lowe of ConocoPhillips, and Robert Malone of BP America.

    Nunn, a U.S. senator from 1972 to 1996, joined Chevron’s board in 1997. While in the Senate, he chaired the Armed Services Committee and the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations.

    In 2007, Chevron awarded Nunn nearly $345,000 in total compensation, according to an SEC filing Tuesday.

    Robertson, vice chairman, had total compensation of about $14.2 million last year, according to Chevron’s annual proxy statement.

    None of the other companies appearing in Washington Tuesday has such a direct connection to U.S. lawmakers, but ConocoPhillips does have diplomatic ties. Former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage and former ambassador and Assistant Secretary of State J. Stapleton Roy are Conoco directors.

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  • Sale of Blixseths’ Yellowstone Club falls through

    Recent weeks have brought financial upheaval to Tim Blixseth.

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    Robert Frank of the Wall Street Journal reports today the collapse of a deal to Yellowstone Club, the exclusive resort developed by Blixseth and his wife. CrossHarbor Capital Partners of Boston sent a letter March 26 saying it was pulling out of an agreement to buy the club for $450 million.

    Blixseth informed club members on Saturday that the club is no longer on the market.

    The Associated Press reported yesterday that Blixseth had sold a 160-parcel at the club, where he once planned to build the world’s most expensive home.

    And Bloomberg reported earlier this month that Blixseth missed a $20 million payment to champion cyclist Greg LeMond and three other Yellowstone investors. Blixseth said then that he couldn’t pay the sum, which settled a lawsuit over Yellowstone holdings, until he sold the club.

    In addition to the expensive lawsuit, Blixseth is in the midst of a divorce from his wife, Edra. The split started as a friendly one, so friendly that Frank wrote about it. “Their peaceable parting marks a triumph of hope over history, and reason over money,” he wrote. “Most wealthy spouses follow the greed principle: The more stuff you have, the more there is to fight over.”

    Over time, hope and reason apparently fell victim to history and money. The Blixseths wound up in court and the club they had built together went on the market.

    Members of the private golf and ski area include Bill Gates and former vice president Dan Quayle.

    (Note: This item was first posted on Sunday, March 30, and updated Monday, March 31, 2008.)

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    • #1.   Anne Hall 03.30.2008

      Is this all you have time to do in your life? Have you asked those individuals and their families if they want their names on your diagram? Your information is incorrect. I would encourage you to spend your time and money productively instead of writing damaging gossip columns. Perhaps you could go out and make a fortune, and then others can write about you.

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  • Bear Stearns bid would mean $100M to Joe Lewis

    Things are looking up, but only slightly, for Bahama billionaire Joe Lewis.

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    JPMorgan Chase today upped its offer for Bear Stearns from the bargain-basement price of $2 a share to $10 share. The increase amounts to an additional $97 million for Lewis, who holds 8.35% of the company stock.

    Yet even at the higher price, Lewis will lose mightily. Over the past year, he has bought up Bear Stearns shares at an average price of $104. At $10 per share, his losses would exceed $1 billion.

    Like many stockholders, Lewis was outraged by the initial deal. In documents filed last week with the Securities and Exchange Commission, he promised that his companies would “take whatever action that they deem necessary and appropriate to protect the value of their investment.”

    The Bear Stearns bailout and the resulting shareholder outcry have combined to bring unwanted attention to Lewis and his financial empire. As his daughter Vivienne once explained, “He doesn’t like to talk to people. It aggravates him.”

    Lewis started building his fortune as a teenager, when he left school to work for his father’s London catering firm. He made millions when he sold the business in 1979, then moved to the Bahamas, where he made millions more in currency trading. He oversees a complex of companies centered around a holding company, the Tavistock Group.

    His interests include land development, life sciences, energy, restaurants such as the Napa Valley Grille and the Alcatraz Brewing Company, and sports, including the Tottenham Hotspur soccer team. His company organizes the annual Tavistock Cup golf tournament, scheduled to be played today and tomorrow, with his friend Tiger Woods among the competitors.

    Lewis hasn’t yet publicly responded to JPMorgan’s revised offer, and the SEC listed no new filings from him by the close of the business day. Maybe he chose to spend the day concentrating on golf.

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  • Will the Tribune Company sell Newsday?

    Tribune Company owner Sam Zell may be entertaining bids for Newsday, the company’s Long Island paper, amid mounting financial pressures.

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    Citing an unnamed newspaper industry insider, Crain’s New York Business reported today that News Corp. owner Rupert Murdoch “is believed to have set his sights on Newsday.” Murdoch was reportedly interested in a joint operating agreement between Newsday and his New York Post last year. But the idea went nowhere when Sam Zell took Tribune private in a deal worth $8.2 billion.

    Others expressing interest in buying the tabloid are said to include Mortimer B. Zuckerman, the real-estate developer and publisher who owns the New York Daily News, and James Dolan, whose family controls Cablevision, the cable television operator, the New York Times reported.

    Talk of the possible sale of Newsday surfaced today as Tribune reported a fourth-quarter loss of $79 million. The company acknowledged it may have to sell assets as it struggles past a highly-leveraged December deal that took the company private.

    The dismal results come three months after chairman and CEO Zell, a real estate mogul with no experience in the newspaper business, led a buyout of the struggling company, which owns the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune and the Baltimore Sun, among other newspapers, local television stations and the Chicago Cubs baseball team.

    At the time, Zell said he planned to sell the Cubs and related assets, but wanted to keep most of the rest of the company intact. He also said that additional downsizing was not the answer to historic changes in the newspaper industry. But in the three months since, he has cut jobs, citing falling advertising revenue and a tanking economy.

    Tribune said today it has “begun a strategic review of certain Tribune assets to determine whether capital can be more effectively redeployed into our core operations or toward reducing our outstanding leverage.”

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