Deutsche Bank: Privately Held Newspapers Are Suffering Too

By: Jennifer Saba July results are shaping up to look like June?s weak performance according to a report from Deutsche Bank.

Deutsche Bank's David T. Clark -- who picks up coverage of the newspaper industry from Paul Ginocchio as lead analyst -- has a twist in this report. He surveyed eight privately held newspaper companies to get a grip on July and August advertising trends relative to May and June.

Five of the eight companies that participated said July was the same as June (read: way soft) while three of those companies said July was actually worse. The private companies are not named.

Classified help-wanted was a sore spot at four of the companies as listings dropped "meaningfully," according to the note.

Clark also takes the temperature of the national advertising category using USA Today and Sunday magazines as a thermometer. In July, USA Today ad page counts dropped 16% -- better than June, which was down 28% and May, down 20%. Clark suspects the national daily is discounting its advertising rates and that revenue may have declined more than volume.

Collectively, ad pages at Parade, USA Weekend, American Profile, and The New York Times Magazine turned in results similar to USA Today?s: volume is down 16% in July. So far in August, ad page counts have skidded 26%.