HARTFORD, Conn.-
Tribune Co. has agreed to sell two Connecticut newspapers to Virginia-based Gannett Co. Inc., according to published reports Friday.
Gannett, the nation’s largest newspaper company and owner of USA Today, will purchase the Greenwich Time and The Advocate of Stamford, according to The Washington Post and the Chicago Tribune, citing unnamed sources.
The Stamford and Greenwich newspapers, the smallest owned by the Tribune, have a combined circulation of 39,000.
The Post in a published report said the deal was worth about $65 million.
Gannett and Tribune officials declined comment Friday. Durham J. Monsma, publisher and chief executive of The Advocate and Greenwich Time, also would not comment.
Gannett outbid Denver-based ap Inc., for the Connecticut newspapers, the Tribune and Post reported.
Chicago-based Tribune announced in September that it planned to sell $500 million in assets. To date, Tribune has sold more than $470 million in assets, including several television stations and a printing facility in Los Angeles.
If the deal as described in published reports goes through, it would put the Tribune over that $500 million mark.
Analyst James C. Goss of Barrington Research in Chicago told The Associated Press that the deal makes sense if Tribune decides to shed some of its smaller newspapers before selling its larger properties, including Newsday, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, The (Baltimore) Sun and the Hartford Courant.
Gannett’s newspapers include The Arizona Republic, The Indianapolis Star, The (Louisville, Ky.) Courier-Journal, Detroit Free Press and The Cincinnati Enquirer.
Shares of Tribune closed Friday at $30.05, down 9 cents, on the New York Stock Exchange. Gannett fell by 84 cents, to $60.37 a share.
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