Regarding an upcoming meeting of the board of directors under Chairman and CEO Craig Dubow (left), Anonymous@8:29 p.m. said:I think many of us here are missing the significance of the dividend fight. If Dubow is forced to ask the board of directors to lower or scrap the dividend, he will be committing suicide. This is a company that is so proud about the dividend it pays on its stock that it has increased the dividend for each year over the last 39 years through previous recessions and downturns. To be forced into changing that policy now is an unforgiveable breach of company policy, and an embarrassment that cannot be erased. We all wait to see what happens at the board of directors meeting and whether Dubow emerges from that session with the dividend intact, or he is gone. This is going to be one hell of a board of directors meeting.
Please post your replies in the comments section, below. To e-mail confidentially, write gannettblog[at]gmail[dot-com]; see Tipsters Anonymous Policy in the green sidebar, upper right.
"If Dubow is forced to ask the board of directors to lower or scrap the dividend, he will be committing suicide."
ReplyDeleteThat depends. If he can successfully convince the board that Gannett's performance is solely about the economy, instead of any failure in (his) leadership, he might just weather this. Dubow seems to be able to spin with the best of 'em, but I do agree that substantially lowering the company's dividend would NOT be something that would be looked at as favorable from an overall company/stock value perspective.
It's nothing to prove that Gannett is doing better than most other media companies.
ReplyDeleteIf the board can't see the straits we are in, we should use them as iceberg bumpers.
Gannett is far from a perfect company, but can anyone seriously say that its financial problems are due to things other than the overall state of the economy? The board should recognize the dividend is way too high given the stock price and the company's recent performance. They should cut it. The high dividend yield isn't doing anything to prop up the stock's value, and it's a good way to save money at a time when people are losing their jobs, getting furloughed and having their pay frozen.
ReplyDelete