Does News Corp’s news division belong in Fox Corp?
Welcome to a Tuesday update from Unmade. Today we look at the smoke signals contained in News Corp’s quarterly financial update, and Vinyl Group tangles with the ASX after failing to disclose on time that one of its directors had sold all his shares.
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Fourth pillar, third wheel?
By the time an investor call kicks off, every word of the commentary has been carefully crafted. Doubly so when the words are spoken by News Corp’s chief executive Robert Thomson, who amuses himself by cramming every statement with as many alliterations as possible - “The currency of credibility will become even more crucial”.
The latest quarterly update from News Corp, the first since the Foxtel sale closed, was no exception. Thomson told the market: “Following the close of the quarter, we concluded the sale of Foxtel to DAZN, highlighting our intention to concentrate investment on three core pillars of growth; Dow Jones, digital real estate, and book publishing.”
Given that with the removal of its video segment leaves only four segments, that looks like a signal regarding News Corp’s fourth segment: news media.