No one wants to pay $5 billion to buy Dow Jones (DJ), except Rupert Murdoch. Part of the logic behind his News Corp (NWS) owning that financial information company is that it can be used to help him start his Fox Business channel which will compete with CNBC. The reasoning may be a bit thin, but it is still a state goal of the transaction.
The FT, owned by Pearson (PSO), and CNBC, a unit of GE (GE), don’t want to buy anything. So, they are forming a joint venture. At first, CNBC will be able to put FT articles at its website and the FT will run CNBC content at FT.com. Of course, if someone bookmarks both sites the content is available with a key stroke.
Neither FT.com or CNBC does very well. FT.com has 91,000 paid subscribers and CNBC is only the 58th most popular financial new website according to data published in The Wall Street Journal. But, as the cost of producing financial news rises, it is not hard to see two organizations like these sharing reporting and sales resource to save money. And, if a WSJ hook up with Fox Business News works, they may have to find some savings.
Douglas A. McIntyre
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