This heavily sourced article examines Alden Global Capital’s history of insider deals and cronyism. It traces the career of Alden founder and Tribune Director Randall Smith from a “bottom feeder” in the 1980s to a retail titan in the 2010s who oversaw the elimination of over 20,000 jobs.
It looks at Alden’s liquidation strategy for the papers it controls within MediaNews Group (Alden owns 70% of MNG). It examines how Alden used MNG to extract cash from newspapers to finance a failed investment in a southern pharmacy chain.
It explores how Alden appears to have breached its fiduciary duties when, as trustees of MNG newspaper pension plans, it vastly over-invested in Alden assets.