This information has been circulating for a few days without anyone taking the trouble to deny it. It could be titled: “The regional daily press is in perfect economic health and is totally independent of financial and political powers?”
We propose it as it might interest “our” regional daily, which we wish to maintain as the reference for local information. This without shifting into other logics. A newspaper must be a tool for information before becoming a financial “asset.”
It was at Bercy, in front of the high-ranking Finance officials, that the fate of the Hersant Média Group, aka GHM, was sealed on Monday, October 10, 2011.
Owned by the 13 heirs of the “paper tycoon” and chaired by Philippe Hersant, a tax resident in Switzerland (!), GHM employs 7,500 employees and owns, among others, Nice-Matin, Var-Matin, La Provence, Paris-Normandie, France-Antilles, and L’Union de Reims.
In addition, it has a free press empire, which is in decline.
In 2010, the group posted losses of 82.080 million euros on a turnover of 748,599,000 euros, and its debt reached 215,909,000 euros.
For months, the banks have been demanding that the Hersant family put more money into the pot. They have always refused. As well as selling their most profitable newspapers, especially overseas.
But with the hole continuing to deepen and the banks (with BNP at the forefront) having had enough of paying, Bercy had to intervene and supervise the negotiations between the Hersant family, the creditors, the court-appointed administrator, and the only candidate for a partial takeover of the group’s newspapers, the Belgian Rossel(1).
Already the majority owner of the Voix du Nord, the Rossel group, as revealed by RTL, should therefore take control of L’Union de Reims and the subsidiaries in the northeast of France and 50% of the South-East division, starting with Nice-Matin and La Provence.
The remainder will stay in the hands of the Hersant family. At least for now.
As for the banks, they should write off nearly 150 million euros.
