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Financial Times

Posts Tagged ‘Financial Times’

Buzzfeed v Financial Times: culture clash exposed by Zoom spying story

Mark Di Stefano was media and tech correspondent at the Financial Times. That’s a great news beat. Media writing about media is pretty fun. And media loves reading about media. It’s a beat that gets your name known among your peers. But he blew it. Last Friday the Australian journalist tweeted: “Hi, letting everyone know today was my last day at the FT. This afternoon I offered my resignation. Thank you everyone who has given support. I’m now going to take some time away and log off x.” What he did is a tale best told by the Independent, one of the two publications he upset (the other being its sister organ The Evening Standard):

Mark Di Stefano, media and technology correspondent for the FT, listened in as staff at The Independent were told of pay cuts and furloughs on 23 April in response to the economic consequences of the coronavirus pandemic. Before the call had concluded, and before staff employed in America and elsewhere had been told the news, Di Stefano tweeted the details. Shortly afterwards he published an article on the Financial Times website, revealing confidential information about the advertising downturn experienced at The Independent and quoting the company’s chief executive, Zach Leonard. He attributed the information to “people on the call”.

The FT apologised for one of their own breaking their rules. The FT’s code of conduct states:

“The press must not seek to obtain or publish material acquired by … intercepting private or mobile telephone calls, messages or emails. Engaging in misrepresentation or subterfuge … can generally be justified only in the public interest and then only when the material cannot be obtained by other means.”

Entertainment reporter Peter Ford is quoted in Media Week:

“Hope you learn from this. You’ve orchestrated campaigns against many people, including myself, in the past. You’ve encouraged pile-ons and a cancel culture against anyone you consider ‘conservative leaning’. Despite this I hope in time you bounce back as you’re clearly not a fool.”

It’s worthwhile looking at a few words on Di Stefano’s training and readiness for the role:

His remit at BuzzFeed in 2014? “Simon [founding editor Simon Crerar] said just break news.” His title was breaking news reporter. Looking back at those years, he said: “I had no idea what to do. I tweeted a lot and chased the biggest story of the day. For the first year and a half I wrote up any story I could find and then I was appointed political editor.”

And then he joined the FT, working with Janine Gibson, who he’d worked with when they were both at Buzzfeed:

I networked as much as I could taking people out for coffees and drinks. I realised the way to be a reporter in 2020 hasn’t changed that much – it’s all about who you know, having mobile phone numbers and being able to call and text message sources. Old school reporting techniques make for the best stories.”

Journalism can’t be about anything is fair game if you can gain access to it. The editor of The Independent Christian Broughton goes on the record:

“We respect freedom of speech and understand the challenges of newsgathering, but The Independent considers the presence of a third-party journalist in a staff briefing to be entirely inappropriate and an unwarranted intrusion into our employees’ privacy. Our spokesperson had a full statement prepared for the press – any interested reporters only needed to call and ask.”

It wasn’t a scoop. It was just a journalist breaking a press embargo in a rush to yell ‘first’.

Posted: 5th, May 2020 | In: News | Comment


Coronavirus Law : the newspapers lead with house arrest

We’re all under house arrest in the UK – unless you need to go shopping, jogging or sell discount trainers and anoraks at Sports Direct. (Prime Minister Boris Johnson says all UK shops selling non-essential goods must close. Sports Direct says it is “uniquely well placed to help keep the UK as fit and healthy as possible”. And you can betcha last cough drop its staff agree.) The coronavirus is among us. The “invisible killer” (copyright: all media) is the only story around.

Coronavirus newspapers

“End of freedom,” the Daily Telegraph declares. “Britain shuts up shop,” says Daily Mail. The Sun says we’re under “House arrest”. The Daily Mirror calls it a “national lockdown”. The Financial Times says the Government had not choice but to enforce social isolation. The Metro shows how people were ignoring the polite advice as they packed themselves into stuffy Tube trains in London. (How long can the freebie Metro and Evening Standard newspapers last without commuters?) Not one newspaper is critical of anything the Government has ruled., including fines for anyone caught breaking the rules, which can amount to three people not from the same house playing football together.

Coronavirus newspapers
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Posted: 24th, March 2020 | In: Key Posts, News, Tabloids | Comment


Monarch: paper profits and discounts as capital for the super rich

Monarch Airlines is bust. And in the Sunday Times we get an insight into the bizarro world of the mega-mega-rich. Monarch is owned by private equity outfit Greybull.

Amid a battle for orders between Boeing and Airbus, Monarch secured a cut-price deal for 30 new planes — which later rose to 45. The market value of the aircraft was greater than Monarch’s agreed price, so creating a paper profit.

And then it got even better.

Greybull was able to persuade Boeing to release more than £100m of this trapped equity as cash, pumping it into the airline through Petrol Jersey.

Can it be that the seller gave discount as capital?

And why now did the firm bust? The Times notes:

Questions have been raised about timing. Monarch went down with £48m of cash in the bank, over which Greybull has a strong claim as primary secured creditor. Swaffield’s statement revealed that the cash pile was shrinking rapidly and would have been £20m by the end of the month. Greybull’s Marc Meyohas said the timing of the collapse “was influenced by Atol, not by us running out of cash”.

Fair enough?

“The families, Greybull, Petrol Jersey, however you want to put it, will have lost money on this deal,” said Marc Meyohas. “We are absolutely disappointed by the outcome. We do feel we have been responsible owners, but we have failed nonetheless.”

As for placing questions marks over the owners, well, is it fair to portray them as grinners, as the FT does?

 

 

Expect a lot to follow – little of which will help the poor sods now out of jobs and fretting about pensions.

Spotter: Times

Posted: 8th, October 2017 | In: Broadsheets, Money | Comment


Letter Of The Day: The Financial Times Is Best For Keeping Champagne Cold

LETTER of the day: why did you read the Financial Times:

finanacial times champagne

 

Spotter: @jimallthetime)

Posted: 13th, January 2014 | In: Money, Reviews, The Consumer | Comment


Election In Photos: Manish Sood Damns Gordon Brown And Other Tactics

MANISH Sood, the Labour Party’s candidate for North West Norfolk, says Gordon Brown is the worst Prime Minister Britain has ever had” (via). Bookies Paddy Power , never ones to miss a bit of PR, have projected the face of Conservative Leader David Cameron onto the Houses of Parliament and began paying out on a Conservative win.

In other news, the Financial Times has come out in support of the Conservatives. The only thing that can stop the Tories is tactical voting. The Daily Mirror calls for it. Ed Balls wants it. So, we’re all agreed – vote David Cameron and get rid of Gordon Brown…

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Bookies Paddy Power project the face of Conservative Leader David Cameron onto the Houses of Parliament as they pay out for a Conservative win before a single vote has been cast. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Picture date: Monday May 3, 2010. Paddy Power said it is so sure of a Tory victory that it is stumping up £100,000 before the results of Thursday's ballot are revealed. The pay-out applies to single bets placed before 9pm last night. See PA story ELECTION Betting. Photo credit should read: David Parry/PA Wire

Posted: 4th, May 2010 | In: Reviews | Comments (3)


Financial Markets Rally On The Susan Boyle Factor

SUSAN Boyle Watch: Anorak’s looks at Britain’s Got Talent agonist Susan Boyle in the news and how she is helping the financial markets rally. It’s the Boyle Bounce!

What do equity rallies have in common with the whizzing around in cyberspace of the latest Youtube sensation — a clip of Britain’s Got Talent contestant Susan Boyle wowing the judging panel of Simon Cowell, Amanda Holden and Piers Morgan?

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Posted: 18th, April 2009 | In: Money | Comment


A Good Day To Bury Goldman Sachs

U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman, Christopher Cox, last seen trying, and failing, to explain to Congress just how the US financial institutions could be so comprehensively f*cked without him noticing anything amiss, has issued another defence of his regime coupled with a clarion call for improved regulation.

In the darkest reaches of the Washington Post.

On Election Day.

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Posted: 4th, November 2008 | In: Money | Comments (3)