May 8 (Bloomberg) -- Dow Jones & Co., whose controlling shareholders rebuffed a $5 billion takeover bid from News Corp. last week, said advertising revenue at the Wall Street Journal fell the most in almost two years last month.
Ad sales dropped 12 percent and volume fell 13 percent, dragged down by a 35 percent plunge in computer-technology advertising and a drop of 16 percent in financial ads, New York- based Dow Jones said today in a statement.
Rupert Murdoch's $60-a-share bid for the company, majority owned by the Bancroft and Ottaway families, was motivated most by his desire for the Wall Street Journal and its Web site. The Journal, the second-largest U.S. newspaper by circulation, has lost advertising after a redesign earlier this year.
``When you see these kinds of results coming from current management, $60 a share looks even more attractive,'' said Peter Kreisky, president of Kreisky Media Consultancy in New York. ``The Bancroft and Ottaway families may not like the idea of being owned by Rupert Murdoch, but these numbers don't support current management's skills.''
Revenue at the Journal dropped 0.6 percent in March and 10 percent in February.
Dow Jones, also publisher of the weekly business magazine Barron's and owner of Dow Jones Newswires, trimmed the size of the Journal to save money on newsprint and to make the newspaper more attractive to commuters and younger readers.
No. 2 to USA Today
The newspaper's daily circulation of 2.06 million trails only Gannett Co.'s USA Today.
Dow Jones shares fell 51 cents to $55 at 4:02 p.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. They surged 55 percent on May 1, when the bid by News Corp. became public.
Class A shares of New York-based News Corp., owner of 170 newspapers, the Fox Television network, the Fox News channel and the Twentieth Century Fox movie studio, fell 34 cents to $21.75.
Murdoch announced his offer on May 1, calling it a ``big, generous offer'' and describing the Journal as the ``greatest newspaper in America.''
Dow Jones's board said later it would ``take no action'' on the offer because members of the Bancroft family controlling 52 percent of the votes rejected the bid. It didn't elaborate on the statement.
James Ottaway Jr., a former Dow Jones executive whose family controls 6.2 percent of voting rights, said this week that he also opposes the offer.
Advertising revenue at Barron's, rose 46 percent in April because it had published one additional issue in the month compared with April 2006.
Ad sales at local newspapers in the Ottaway chain dropped 11 percent. Local advertisers canceled ads in April after flooding in New York state and New England, the company said.
To contact the reporter on this story: Leon Lazaroff in New York at llazaroff@bloomberg.net .
