# FP Newspapers Inc - (FP.TO)



## WillyA (Apr 14, 2011)

What do you think? the dividend yield currently is really good (around 10%) I just want to know if the dividend is sustainable http://ca.finance.yahoo.com/q?s=FP.TO


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## the-royal-mail (Dec 11, 2009)

Any comments on this one? Stock seems to be in the mid point of the 52 week average and has not reduced their 5 cent monthly dividend since 2011 (over 11% annually).


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## doctrine (Sep 30, 2011)

Profitable, but revenues are declining year after year (down 5% in 2013 over 2012). I like small profitable companies like this, but with no reasonable prospect for higher revenues then I would avoid.


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## tygrus (Mar 13, 2012)

Sounds like Yellow Media all over again. Seriously, newspapers are as dead as doornails or about to be. Everything moving online and be virtually free. Globe & Mail used to charge $1 per paper, now they charge 99 cents for an entire month of online content. Even then, there are tricks to get around the paywall and get the content anyway.


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## HaroldCrump (Jun 10, 2009)

IMO, paywalls are a wrong move for newspapers and magazines.
To some extent, I can understand premium publications like The Economist expecting people to pay for their content, but ho-hum, mundane publications like Globe & Mail, Money Sense magazine, Financial Post, etc. - they are hallucinating if they think millions of readers will pay them a monthly fee to read their content.

There may be ways around it by deleting cookies, etc. but who cares.
There is hardly anything unique or premium in these publications.

This company - FP - seems to publish bottom of the barrel rags like Winnipeg Free Press, Brandon Sun, etc.
Literally no one cares.


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## tkirk62 (Jul 1, 2015)

I, along with everybody else in the world knows that newspapers are dying businesses. In that sense this company looks to be a bad investment.

But I think this stock could be one of those famed "cigar butt" stocks. Even with a big drop in earnings, earnings should still cover the 18% dividend for a few years. Or they could cut the dividend again (unlikely since they just cut it at the end of 2014) and put more towards the debt. This would help with the huge discount to book value as well.

I just think that even though this is in a dying industry, the fact that they are profitable warrants a higher valuation than this. 

Right now, the possible upsides: sit and collect a 18% dividend for a few years, get taken out, acquire another paper (Winnipeg Sun?) and apply synergies to squeeze a profit out of it, share price simply increases because it has dropped too far

outweigh the possible downsides: share price keeps falling as revenue drops fasted than expected, dividend suspended, revenue streams other than conventional newspapers do not increase, cost cutting has already been maximized,, bankruptcy down the road.

At least in my opinion the share price is low enough and to warrant a speculative, contrarian, value investment.


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## martinv (Apr 30, 2009)

I invested in FP newspapers in 2006 @ $10.25. 8 years later, in 2014 I finally sold @ $4.31. One year later, it is @ $1.75!
I normally never sell, but am very glad I did on this one.
The loss wasn't as large as it appears due to the dividends but it was a slow, painful experience. 
For 8 years, every quarter, management would say they are cutting costs, working on the digital side etc. It just didn't work out.
So my 0.02 is just don't do it.


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## CPA Candidate (Dec 15, 2013)

I owned this very briefly in 2012, got out with a small gain. At that time it was considered a cigar butt stock, the butt is just ever smaller now. Don't be the smoker who burns their lips off. 

Last quarter looked terrible and the quality of the paper in terms of writing is quickly declining. It's turned into a social justice, identity politics blog, nearly all the writers are big lefties which leaves me out in the cold. Now the website is completely pay-walled which means advertisers can't even reach me because I stopped visiting the site. A reversal of fortune seems unlikely here.


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## CPA Candidate (Dec 15, 2013)

It's really getting ugly now.

http://cawidgets.morningstar.ca/Art...CAN:FP&MaxCount=10&popup=true&_=1439746640167

Recorded an impairment of goodwill related to their investment in the FPLP and suspended the dividend completely after reducing earlier in the year. At that time they indicated that the new lower dividend was sustainable.

Quite possibly the best example of a value trap, a business that is so mature it doesn't even qualify as a cash cow anymore, incapable of paying dividends, and has entered the terminal decline phase.

This is what Stephen Tackacy, portfolio manager, had to say about it recently.

June 2013

"Considers it a big community news paper. Won many awards for content. Older readers. Been accumulating shares for years. Technology is having an impact but their subscriptions are stable. Dividend is very high and very safe. Management has managed the company well. One of his biggest holdings."

Dec 2014

"He has a big position. Very well managed. It is News Papers so they are under pressure for advertising revenues. The dividend is very sustainable now. Yield is 12% and they should be able to sustain that for years."

Seems like he's completely out of touch.


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## supperfly17 (Apr 18, 2012)

CPA Candidate said:


> It's really getting ugly now.
> 
> http://cawidgets.morningstar.ca/Art...CAN:FP&MaxCount=10&popup=true&_=1439746640167
> 
> ...


Or he was shorting the stock all along....


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## tkirk62 (Jul 1, 2015)

Yup this one was definitely not one of my better moves. Never underestimate the pressure debt can put on a company


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