How else to explain a weird spike in New York Times (NYT) shares?

Sometime after noon today, traders started bidding the stock way up, from $11 to $12, though it’s now dropping back down again. As I write this, shares are moving down to the $11.60 range, which is still a jump of six percent, without any obvious reason.

Unless you count the news today that the paper is printing international editions in Bosnia and El Salvador (really).

Looky here (click chart to enlarge):

Briefing.com (via Barrons) posits that the spike is based a supposed rumor that Carlos Slim, the billionaire who made a high-interest loan to the paper last year, now wants to buy the whole thing.

But if something that nonsensical can move the market, why stop there? Why not suggest, for instance, that investors were tickled pink about the new photo slideshow tool the Times is showing off on its front page? (It really is pretty cool. You should check it out.)

Oh, for the record, the Times has nothing to say about this. Per spokeswoman Diane McNulty: “It’s not our practice to comment on Internet rumors.”

Meanwhile, as Adam Isserlis at Rubenstein Communications notes, the Times isn’t the only newspaper stock popping today: E. W. Scripps (SSP) is up more than 12 percent in a flat market. No discernible reason for that rise, either. Oh, and Gannett (GCI) and Media General (MEG) are up too.

But for better or worse, none of that matters to investors, who are trying to figure out what the company’s long-term prospects look like. In the near term, they look terrible.

In the first three months of this year, the New York Times Company (NYT) lost $74.5 million, or 34 cents a share once you factor out one-time charges, on revenue of $609 million. That’s worse than Wall Street’s low expectations of a five-cent loss on revenue of $630.8 million.

The reason, of course, is that the ad market is miserable in general, and even more so for newspapers. The company’s ad revenue was down 27 percent, notably worse than the awful 17.6 percent decline the Times recorded in the last quarter of 2008.

And as in the last quarter, former bright spots like the Internet business have now gone dark as well: Internet revenue was down 5.6 percent, Internet ad sales declined 6.1 percent, and revenue at the Times’s About.com unit dropped 4.7 percent.

Expect more of the same for the second quarter of this year, warns CEO Janet Robinson: “At this time, and it is early in the quarter, we believe the rate of decline in ad revenues in the second quarter will be similar to that of the first.”

The Times has been trimming costs (via salary cuts and layoffs) and has bought itself a bit of breathing room by getting rid of its dividend, taking on a very expensive loan from Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim and selling off assets like its Manhattan headquarters. It still has some moves it can make–it is trying to unload its stake in the Boston Red Sox and to find a buyer for the Boston Globe.

But at some point it’s going to have find a way to start selling more ads again. Because awards alone won’t save the paper–Pulitzers can’t even guarantee their winners’ continued employment.

The Times has stopped providing monthly revenue updates, but it has been pretty good about providing detail via its earnings calls. I’ll be on the road during today’s 11 a.m. call, but will check the transcript and get back to you later with the most interesting nuggets.

It’s a done deal: Billionaire Carlos Slim has given the cash-strapped New York Times (NYT) $250 million worth of breathing room. At a very high price.

Under terms of a deal announced late Monday night, the Mexican telecom magnate has lent the Times $250 million via senior unsecured notes that pay out at 14 percent annual interest. He also gets warrants on 16 million shares of Times “A” stock.

Slim already owns 6.9 percent of the company’s A shares, and the warrants will let him buy another 10 percent. But the Sulzberger family will retain control of the company via its ownership of its “B” class stock.

The Times will use the money to refinance some of its $1.1 billion in debt, including a $400 million revolver that expires in May.

But the cash won’t solve the company’s core problem: Its ads are disappearing, and it has yet to cut cost costs to reflect that reality. And now its costs just increased–it will have to pay Slim $35 million a year in interest.

Brutal. But so are the Times’s prospects.

Here’s the official release:

The New York Times Company Enters into Agreement with Banco Inbursa and Inmobiliaria Carso for $250 Million in Senior Unsecured Notes

The New York Times Company today announced that it had entered into a private financing agreement with Banco Inbursa, S. A., Institucion de Banca Multiple, Grupo Financiero Inbursa (“Banco Inbursa”) and Inmobiliaria Carso for an aggregate amount of $250 million ($125 million each) in senior unsecured notes due 2015 with detachable warrants. The notes will rank equally and ratably on a senior unsecured basis with all senior unsecured obligations of The New York Times Company.

“This agreement provides us with increased financial flexibility to continue to execute on our long-term strategy,” said Janet L. Robinson, president and CEO. “The proceeds from this transaction will be used to refinance existing debt, including amounts currently borrowed under a revolving credit facility that matures in May 2009. We continue to explore other financing initiatives and are focused on reducing our total debt through the cash we generate from our businesses and the decisive steps we have taken to reduce costs, lower capital spending, decrease our dividend and rebalance our portfolio of assets.”

“We are very pleased to expand our strong relationship with The New York Times Company,” said Arturo Elias, director of Inmobiliaria Carso. “We believe that with the strength of The New York Times brand, its national and international reach, its potential for digital expansion and most of all, its world-class news and information, the Company will continue to be a leader in the media industry.”

The notes have a coupon of 14.053 percent, of which the Company may elect to pay 3 percent in kind. The notes are callable beginning three years from the issue date at 105 percent of par, with subsequent call prices declining ratably to par.

Banco Inbursa and Inmobiliaria Carso also received detachable warrants for an aggregate amount of 15.9 million Class A shares (50 percent each), at a strike price of $6.3572. The warrants expire in January 2015.

Mr. Carlos Slim Helu and members of his family are the main shareholders of Grupo Financiero Inbursa, S.A B. de C.V., which is the parent company of Banco Inbursa, and are the owners of Inmobiliaria Carso, which currently holds 6.9 percent of the Times Company’s Class A shares.

[Image Credit: Agencia Brasil, via Wikipedia Commons]

David Faber: The stock price is very low.

Sirius XM CEO Mel Karmazin: It sucks.”

– Mel Karmazin states the obvious in a July 2008 interview with CNBC

At Sirius XM’s (SIRI) annual meeting Thursday, shareholders approved a reverse stock split plan that empowers the board to split common Sirius shares by a 1-for-10 to 1-for-50 ratio by end of 2009. They also approved the issuance of up to 3.5 billion new shares. Should Sirius need to, it can now effect a reverse split that will raise its stock price above the $1 necessary to avoid delisting and sell new shares to meet the almost $1 billion in loan repayments it faces next year.

Sounds like a reasonable plan on the face of things. Trouble is Sirius is trading at around $.14. And at that anemic price, proceeds from a sale of 3.5 billion new shares would amount to just $490 million–less than half the amount of the debt coming due next year. Sirius clearly hopes it won’t have to issue all 3.5 billion shares the vote approved. To do so would dilute existing holdings and drag its share price still deeper into the mud. It would, however, keep the company in business–in the short term. Sirius’s long-term viability is another problem entirely, one that’s not easily solved. With an almost $5 billion loss in its last quarter, subscriber growth plateauing, and the U.S. auto industry–a major source of new Sirius sales–in decline, the satellite radio provider really needs to do something to shore up its ailing business. And its plans to drive subscriber growth, outlined in the second slide below, may not be enough to do it.

PREVIOUSLY:

• Your Report Card Is Your Stock Price? Guess Sirius Is Making Straight $.13’s…
• Save Sirius Coalition Having Trouble Saving Sirius
• Karmazin: Ask Not What Sirius Can Do for You; Ask What You Can Do for Sirius
• Trade You 77 shares of SIRI for 1 Month of “Sirius Everything”
• Sirius CEO: This Sucks

David Faber: The stock price is very low.

Sirius XM CEO Mel Karmazin: It sucks.”

– Mel Karmazin states the obvious in a July 2008 interview with CNBC

At Sirius XM’s (SIRI) annual meeting Thursday, shareholders approved a reverse stock split plan that empowers the board to split common Sirius shares by a 1-for-10 to 1-for-50 ratio by end of 2009. They also approved the issuance of up to 3.5 billion new shares. Should Sirius need to, it can now effect a reverse split that will raise its stock price above the $1 necessary to avoid delisting and sell new shares to meet the almost $1 billion in loan repayments it faces next year.

Sounds like a reasonable plan on the face of things. Trouble is Sirius is trading at around $.14. And at that anemic price, proceeds from a sale of 3.5 billion new shares would amount to just $490 million–less than half the amount of the debt coming due next year. Sirius clearly hopes it won’t have to issue all 3.5 billion shares the vote approved. To do so would dilute existing holdings and drag its share price still deeper into the mud. It would, however, keep the company in business–in the short term. Sirius’s long-term viability is another problem entirely, one that’s not easily solved. With an almost $5 billion loss in its last quarter, subscriber growth plateauing, and the U.S. auto industry–a major source of new Sirius sales–in decline, the satellite radio provider really needs to do something to shore up its ailing business. And its plans to drive subscriber growth, outlined in the second slide below, may not be enough to do it.

PREVIOUSLY:

• Your Report Card Is Your Stock Price? Guess Sirius Is Making Straight $.13’s…
• Save Sirius Coalition Having Trouble Saving Sirius
• Karmazin: Ask Not What Sirius Can Do for You; Ask What You Can Do for Sirius
• Trade You 77 shares of SIRI for 1 Month of “Sirius Everything”
• Sirius CEO: This Sucks

It’s no surprise, obviously, that financial advertising has slowed down in the first three quarters of 2008. The surprise is that it’s only been a 10 percent reduction (so far), according to Nielsen.

There are also some interesting breakdowns: Mortgage and loan companies spent 62 percent less (of course). But credit service companies increased their spend by 22 percent, and investment service companies boosted their spend by six percent.

Here’s Nielsen’s list of top 10 financial advertisers (click chart to enlarge): Note that Bank Of America (BAC), one of the comparative winners during the meltdown, has cut its spend by 30 percent so far this year–slightly more than teetering Citigroup’s (C) 26.5 percent cut. Previously left-for-dead ETrade (ETFC), meanwhile, bumped up its spend by 24.5 percent.

Want more unpleasantness? OK. Comes now yet another ad executive to tell you that next year will be very unpleasant for anyone looking to make a living off of advertising revenue.

U.S. advertising spending will drop 5-8 percent next year, says Steve Lanzano, chief operating officer of MPG North America, a unit of French advertising conglomerate Havas SA. Lanzano predicts that sports advertising, long considered one of the most impervious to downturns, will get roughed up as well:

Even television sports, which have become more popular with advertisers since audiences tend to watch the events live rather than recording them, will suffer from the broad pullback in marketing spending, said Lanzano.

Lanzano estimated 9 to 10 percent of spending on broadcast sports comes from financial services and automotive, both industries that have been in turmoil. ‘That’s a lot of money moving out,’ said Lanzano.

‘Because of the hits in the categories that support sports–whether it’s financial or automotive or retail–I think they might take a little more of a hit than they would in other recessionary periods,’ he said.”

OK. Let’s break the glumness up a bit, shall we? If you’re looking for a cheap laugh, head to the Hollywood Reporter’s take on the Nielsen numbers. Then feast your eyes on the unintentional, yet very successful contextual advertising placed to the right of the story (which is where I borrowed the image currently at the top of this story).