At 92, Rupert Murdoch does not intend to stop. In June, when the Spectator, a small but influential British weekly in conservative circles, has been put up for sale, the news magnate was, according to our sources, among the first to take an interest in the matter. The discussions have not yet been successful, but they once again confirm the perseverance of the Australian-American billionaire, who for years has dreamed of getting his hands on this magazine. Media outlets at the heart of power have always been his passion.
His displayed hyperactivity, however, does not hide the relative decline of his group in the United Kingdom. News Corp, one of the halves of its empire (the other is Fox Corp, which notably owns the American news channel Fox News), published its annual results on Thursday, August 10, ranging from July 2022 to June 2023 .
Overall, the group is doing rather well: a turnover of 9.9 billion dollars (9 billion euros), down slightly for exchange rate reasons, and a pre-tax profit of 330 million, the second highest in ten years. However, most of the growth came from the Dow Jones financial information group, which includes the American daily wall street journal and its 4 million subscribers (85% digital).
Diversification attempt
In the United Kingdom, on the other hand, the dynamic is more sluggish. The most obvious symbol comes from the Sun, whose distribution has been divided by four in fifteen years. After buying it in 1969, the tycoon had made it a dominant force in the British media, with topless pin-ups (the famous “page 3”, so scandalous when it was launched in 1970) and gossip about show business and politics.
At its peak in the 1990s, it sold 4 million copies a day; in 2010, another 3 million; in 2019, only 1.2 million. Since then, News Corp has preferred to remove it from ABC Circulation, the company officially auditing circulation, but it is around 700,000 copies per day.
Of course, the decline of the paper press is global. But, on the one hand, the Sundoubled by the DailyMail (around 750,000 daily copies), is no longer the leading British daily, and, on the other hand, it has failed to find an online paid subscription business model. In 2021, News Corp drew the consequences: its value was reduced to zero in its accounts.
THE Sunwhich has long held a special place in Mr. Murdoch’s heart – “If you want to know what I think, read the Sun », he declared in 2012 –, launched a website for the United States, in order to find a growth driver. The tabloid generates a lot of traffic (159 million unique visitors in July), but this strategy is not profitable. The year 2024 promises to be perilous for the title. Indeed, Prince Harry is suing him, accusing him of having spied on him by recruiting private detectives. The trial is due to be held in January.
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