German FT bites the dust

BERLIN: The final issue of the German business daily newspaper Financial Times Deutschland (FTD) appeared Friday with a black front page and the headline: "In the black at last".

The newspaper, which was never profitable but won high marks over the 12 years of its existence for quality journalism, also omitted some letters from its title, which read Final Times Deutschland.

Its owner, the Hamburg-based publishing house Gruner + Jahr, announced the closure last month with a likely loss of more than 300 jobs. Staff were planning a protest Friday at the editorial office in Hamburg.

A former Italian finance minister, Giuseppe Guarino, 90, brought some black humour in an interview this week to the closure.

A Financial Times Deutschland correspondent, Tobias Bayer, said Guarino had sidestepped some tricky questions by mentioning the impending closure and saying, "I'll answer that afterwards."

Bayer said he had been asking Guarino for his opinion about certain people.

The newspaper was previously the German offshoot of London's Financial Times. It was originally launched as a joint venture between G + J and Pearson, the Financial Times owner. G + J bought out Pearson's 50-per-cent stake in 2008.

Daily newspapers have been on the decline in Germany.

Recent figures from the IVW group, which monitors the distribution of advertising in Germany, showed total sales of weekday newspapers slumping by 3.4% in the third quarter when compared with the same period last year.

The closure leaves the long-established and bigger Handelsblatt as Germany's principal financial daily.

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Article source: http://www.thethailandlinks.com/2012/12/07/german-ft-bites-the-dust/