Sir, – You state in your Editorial (August 7th) that the sale of the Washington Post to Amazon founder, Jeff Bezos, is "for a mere $250 million" and "a bargain anyway, not least in terms of property assets".
The industry consensus is that the price is a generous one, equivalent to 17 times the publishing company’s adjusted earnings. All the more generous considering that the sale excludes the newspaper’s valuable head office building but does include large pension liabilities.
Going by the valuations of other newspaper and media company deals, the Post should have fetched closer to $70 million. Such a large premium would suggest that Bezos is buying a lot of goodwill embedded in the masthead.
It will be fascinating to watch the new owner unveil his business strategy for this iconic title. Warren Buffett (an existing and substantial shareholder in the company) has stated that he thinks Bezos is the best CEO in the US . I would bet that the paper’s future will be increasingly tied to the Kindle, and that the days of the fat, inky, dead-tree paper are severely limited. But this “amazing” deal is a huge vote of confidence in the newspaper industry per se, albeit a sad one for the Graham family who lose their prestigious crown jewel.
And who can say that Richard Nixon is not smiling wanly from the grave? – Yours, e tc,
JOHN O’BYRNE,
Mount Argus Court,
Harold’s Cross,
Dublin 6W.