Tribune Publishing ends talks with McClatchy

Potential anti-trust issues in Florida derailed the deal

Tribune Publishing has terminated negotiations to sell the Chicago-based newspaper company to McClatchy, a source familiar with the matter said Thursday.

The decision, reached by the Tribune Publishing board Thursday, followed several months of negotiations with the Californiabased McClatchy Co. The source said potential antitrust issues in Florida, where McClatchy owns the Miami Herald and Tribune Publishing owns the nearby Sun Sentinel, ultimately derailed a deal between the two companies. Putting both those newspapers under the McClatchy corporate umbrella would have created economic synergies important to the deal but there were concerns it wouldn’t pass muster with federal regulators, multiple sources said.

Both Tribune Publishing spokeswoman Marisa Kollias and McClatchy spokeswoman Jeanne Segal declined to comment Thursday.

Tribune Publishing, formerly known as Tronc, also owns the Baltimore Sun; Hartford Courant; Orlando Sentinel; the New York Daily News; the Capital Gazette in Annapolis, Md.; The Morning Call in Allentown, Pa.; the Daily Press in Newport News, Va.; and The Virginian-Pilot in Norfolk, Va. The company reverted to its legacy name in October.

McClatchy,

apublicly traded company that owns more than 30 newspapers in 14 states, emerged as a potential buyer in September, and was among three suitors to submit a formal bid by Tribune Publishing’s deadline of Nov. 1.

The other bidders include New York-based investment firm Donerail and Dallas-based newspaper group Aim Media. Both of those bids remain on the table, the source said.