Papers targeted for closure by Thomson are still a mystery p.

By: Alan Harman and Mark Fitzgerald

THOMSON CORP., WHICH through the 1980s added newspapers at a rate of about two a month, says it intends to shed an undisclosed number of U.S. and Canadian papers.
However, after taking a charge of $170 million against fourth-quarter 1992 earnings Feb. 16, the Toronto-based chain continues to decline to name the newspapers targeted for sale or closing.
A company spokesman said Thomson is not naming the papers because a few may eventually be retained.
Canadian analysts believe one U.S. daily that Thomson plans to sell is the Bridgeport (Conn.) Post. The Post, with a circulation of about 68,000, is one of the largest-circulation dailies the company operates in the country.
All Post top executives were traveling and unreachable, according to a receptionist in the executive offices.
Harvey Enchin, media reporter for the Thomson-owned Globe and Mail of Toronto, cited unnamed Thomson sources in reporting that as many as two dozen papers could be closed.
"Likely candidates for sale or closing," the Globe and Mail reported, include, in Canada: the 13,000-circulation evening Examiner in Barrie; the 13,000-circulation evening Cambridge Reporter; the 5,500-circulation evening Northern Daily News of Kirkland Lake; and the 10,000-circulation evening Daily Sentinel-Review in the Woodstock-Ingersoll area.
Examiner publisher Garnett Cowsil dismissed the report as a "perpetual rumor."
"They [reporters at the Globe and Mail] are using themselves as a source now ? that's how ridiculous it gets nowadays," he said.
"The comment I will make is that anytime something like this has happened," Cowsil continued, "the staff is always the first to know. I haven't told them anything on this nor do I plan to. It's business as usual here."
Similarly, an official at the Northern Daily News said the paper had "definitely been reassured" that it would not be closed, although a sale is always a possibility.
"We're definitely not in line of being a possible closing," said accountant Bev Ruttan. "We have never lost money from Day One when Lord Thomson started us up."
The publishers of the Cambridge Reporter and Daily Sentinel-Review were both reported to be unreachable.
A Canadian Press report, quoting an unnamed Thomson source, stated that the company had set up what it called the "Toronto division," made up of about 10 Canadian newspapers that had significant problems.
The source said the Ontario papers, in addition to the Sentinel-Review and Cambridge Reporter, included the Pembroke Observer, the Simcoe Reformer, the St. Thomas Times-Journal and the Oshawa Times, all dailies; the daily Brandon Sun in Manitoba; the daily Prince Albert Herald; and the Fort Qu'Appelle and Swift Current community newspapers in Saskatchewan.
The source said Thomson planned to evaluate the papers and determine if they could meet a corporate objective of 24% profit.
Another announcement said Thomson had sold a group of money-losing British business magazines for the equivalent of $37.5 million.
Thomson spokesman Alan Lewis, interviewed by Canadian Press, said about two-thirds of the U.S. write-off reflected shedding assets in North America, mostly in the United States. The remaining third would come from the chain's British properties, Lewis said.
Thomson owns about 120 daily newspapers in the United States and nearly 40 Canadian dailies.
In a statement, Thomson president Michael Brown said the charge also reflects a recession-lowered value of intangible assets like circulation and good will.
"The recessions in North America and the United Kingdom have adversely affected our activities over the past three years, particularly our newspaper businesses," Brown said.
Thomson reported earnings of $232 million for the first nine months of 1992, an increase over reported earnings of $209 million for the same period in 1991, but still down from the $302 million reported for the first three quarters of 1990.