Washington Post rated stable post sale announcement

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NewspaperDespite the well documented problems in the newspaper sector, the Washington Post was able to contribute a moderate amount of cash flow to its parent corporation. However, according to Wall Street watchdog Moody’s Investors Service, WaPo’s overall rating remains intact after the sale announcement.


According to Moody’s Carl Salas, the newspaper was good for about 14% of the company’s consolidated cash flow. Other media income streams include cable at 23% and broadcast television stations at 12%. 62% of the company’s income comes from its education lines.

According to Salas, the $250M sale to Amazon.com exec Jeff Bezos will leave the company’s Baa1 Corporate Family Rating unchanged; and unfortunately, its outlook remains Negative.

The newspaper contributed cash flow, but also incurred a lot of expense to do so.

Cable ONE is WaPo’s cable unit, with 1.4M homes passed and just south of 600K subscribers.

The television group boasts six stations, five of which aremajor network affiliates.