The Los Angeles Times Media Group made a loss of almost $50m (£37m) in 2024, according to newly published unaudited accounts.
The business made a loss from operations of $41.8m in the year ending 29 December and a total net loss before taxes of $48.1m. This followed a reported loss of more than $30m in 2023.
In the six months ending 29 June this year, the Los Angeles Times made a further $17.3m loss from operations – a total net loss before income taxes of $21.5m.
The figures were published after Los Angeles Times Media Group revealed plans to sell shares priced at $5,000 to investors to raise up to $500m.
The Los Angeles Times does not usually disclose its financial information as a private company. Potential investors were told their investment information will be kept confidential.
Under the new plans, the 144-year-old newspaper and advertising/content production division LA Times Studios are integrating with gaming and e-sports company Nant Games and production company Nant Studios as Los Angeles Times Media Group. They will all use one content management platform, Graphene.
The newspaper has been owned by chairman and CEO Dr Patrick Soon-Shiong since June 2018, when he bought it from Tribune Publishing Company. He has since invested $750m.
A deck provided for potential investors acknowledged that the media group may not be able to get into profitability.
It said: “Our ability to achieve profitability will depend on our ability to generate and sustain substantially increased revenues.
“We have incurred significant losses, and we may continue to incur losses in the future… as we execute our growth strategy… We cannot guarantee that we will be able to increase our revenue to achieve or maintain profitability or generate positive cash flow.”
The company is targeting a public listing on the New York Stock Exchange in 2027.
Investors would get paid a 7% annual dividend and they would be able to convert their shares at a 25% discount when the company goes public.
Soon-Shiong told the Los Angeles Times last week that although the business has made significant financial losses during his ownership, the merger with the Nant-branded operations will take it close to breaking even.
“We are now at a place of efficiency,” he said.
The investor deck revealed print still made up more than half (54%) of revenue at Los Angeles Times Media Group in 2024.
Some 39% ($92.8m) came from print circulation with 15% ($35.6m) from print advertising.
Meanwhile 13% ($31.6m) came from digital subscriptions and 10% ($24.5m) from digital advertising.
In the first six months of 2025, the proportion of revenue coming from print fell to 44% as other revenue types (including IP, licensing, retail commerce, live events and studio space rental) grew.
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Operating expenses totalled $279.4m in 2024, of which $131.4m was staff costs.
The Los Angeles Times laid off more than 20% of its newsroom (at least 115 people) at the start of 2024. Soon-Shiong said at the time the cuts were necessary because the title could “no longer lose $30m to $40m a year without making progress toward building higher readership that would bring in advertising and subscriptions to sustain the organisation”.
A further 74 roles, or about 13% of the newsroom, had been cut six months earlier.
The investor documents show that the media group had about 615 full-time employees as of 30 September.
Members of the Los Angeles Times Guild, who now number just over 200 people, down from about 450 in 2022, have voted this month to authorise an open-ended strike following years of contract negotiations without resolution.
The union said: “The newsroom’s remaining journalists have gone four years without a cost-of-living increase, even as inflation pushed the cost of food, rent, healthcare and other essentials steadily upward.”
The newsbrand says it now has 47 million unique website visitors per month and 16 million followers on social media.
Daily print circulation fell 25% to 79,000 in 2024, paid digital subscriptions are at 243,000 and 500,000 people are paying to access Los Angeles Times content across all digital platforms, for example via Apple News+.
Adjusted EBITDA (earnings before income taxes excluding depreciation and amortisation, interest income, interest expense, loss on assets from a plant closure, restructuring costs, and other non-recurring costs) was a loss of $24.4m in 2024 and then of $3.4m in the first six months of 2025.
The business acknowledged it has a “significant amount of debt” at about $207m and that more might be needed.
Other risks to investors included being able to “profitably shift from a legacy print media operation”, withstand AI search and other referral changes, and threats to brand reputation “including as a result of generative AI tools misattributing incorrect information to us”.
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