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New York Times puts Red Sox stake on the block
2009-01-28
CHICAGO - The New York Times Co said on Wednesday it hired banking firm Goldman Sachs to help it sell its stake in the Boston Red Sox baseball team. The 17.75 percent stake is in New England Sports Ventures (NESV), which owns the Red Sox, their home field of Fenway park and adjacent real estate. It also owns half of the Roush Fenway Racing NASCAR team and an 80 percent stake in the NESN regional sports cable TV network. The Times acquired its stake in NESV in February 2002. Sports bankers previously said the company could raise as much as $200 million from a sale of its stake. The publisher confirmed its interest in selling the stake on the same day that it reported lower fourth-quarter profit and a nearly 18 percent drop in advertising revenue. A company spokeswoman said that the Red Sox sale does not include the possibility of selling The Boston Globe, which the Times Co bought for more than $1 billion in the early 1990s, but which has lost most of its value since then.
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