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| At first glance |
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 Throughout 60 years... Hürriyet from past to present |
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Financial Highlights |
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Main factors affecting operational performance |
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Hürriyet at first glance
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THROUGHOUT 60 YEARS... HÜRRİYET FROM PAST TO PRESENT It was May 1st, 1948... Printing presses tart up at Hürriyet for the very first time. This will leave an indelible mark on Turkey;waking the country up to a new newspaper. While humanity left behind the first half of the 20th century with one world war after the other, the sun has risen on a new global era. During the Republic of Turkey's transition to democracy, also known as the switch from a single-party system to a multiparty system, Hürriyet set out with the purpose of “ingraining and defending democracy.” Those were the years when the world's nations came together to heal the wounds of the war. Western powers agreed on the main principles of NATO; the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted at the General Assembly of the United Nations; the Organization for European Economic Co-operation came into being; and England proposed that the “Council of Europe” be formed, these were also painful years of change for Turkey. The most extensive staff of reporters and columnists in Turkey Under these circumstances, Hürriyet was introduced to its readers on May 1st, 1948 and began writing the history of Turkey. With the same enthusiasm of that first day, for 60 years and following the “every morning a new day begins and the printing press runs” approach, Hürriyet became the most widely-read newspaper in Turkey and the mirror of a diverse society. As a newspaper of the masses, Hürriyet has a diverse reader base, from the coffeehouses in the remotest corner of Turkey to the household kitchens. Hürriyet reaches more than two million people daily, 60% of which are regular readers. More than 65% of its readers have college degrees and belong to the high-income segment of the population. Doing journalism without deviating from its guiding principle of providing “impartial, first-hand and accurate reports” since the first day, Hürriyet has become the leader and a role model in the sector. Hürriyet has now become a source of accurate reporting and honest news analysis for all Turkish-speaking people around the world. It is a platform of free speech where diverse views are expressed in keeping with the “Core Values and Editorial Principles” of Doğan Yayın Holding. Today, in addition to the largest staff of reporters and columnists in Turkey, Hürriyet supports this platform with regional offices in Istanbul, Ankara, Izmir, Adana, Antalya and Trabzon, as well as a news network comprised of 52 offices and 600 reporters in Turkey and abroad, all affiliated with Doğan News Agency, which primarily serves newspapers and television channels that are under the management of Doğan Yayın Holding. Hürriyet is printed at Doğan Printing Centers located in six cities in Turkey and in Frankfurt, Germany. Doğan Dağıtım (Distribution), Turkey's leading distribution company in printed material, is responsible for the domestic distribution of the newspaper. Powerful regional player of the global economy Operating under the umbrella of Doğan Yayın Holding, a strong regional player inthe global economy, in addition to its core business of journalism, Hürriyet has expanded into printing, distribution, online services, book publishing, classified ads, TV productions and marketing over the years through its domestic and overseas subsidiaries and affiliates, in keeping with developments and requirements of the sector. In April 2007, Hürriyet acquired a 67.3% equity stake in Trader Media East (TME), the leading ad publishing company in Eastern Europe and Russia, through a tender offer at the London Stock Exchange. This transaction transformed Hürriyet into a regional player for advertisements in nine countries including Russia. As a result of this major investment, which marked the first time a Turkish company acquired an international corporation that was already a leader in its field, TME joined the Hürriyet family with operations in EU countries Poland, Hungary and Lithuania, as well as Russia, Ukraine, Croatia, Belarus and Kazakhstan. Undoubtedly, this investment is a turning point in Hürriyet's global journey that began long time ago. The first and only media company in Turkey to be assigned a credit rating by an international rating agency With an average daily circulation of 572,000 in 2007, Hürriyet is the sector leader in Turkey in terms of both daily average net sales and ad revenue. According to 2007 figures, Hürriyet enjoyed a 12.2% market share in total ad revenue and a 39% market share in overall newspaper ad revenue in Turkey. Among the newspapers published in Turkey, Hürriyet has the strongest financial structure and is the first and only media company in the country to be assigned a credit rating by an international rating agency. On April 3, 2007, Fitch Ratings, the international credit rating agency, assigned Hürriyet a long-term foreign currency credit rating of BB with a stable outlook. Fitch Ratings also affirmed Hürriyet's long-term local currency credit rating of BB with a stable outlook and national credit rating of AA (Tur) with a stable outlook. After going public in 1992, Hürriyet has been one of the best performing stocks on the Istanbul Stock Exchange (ISE). Hürriyet weathered the turmoil in the financial markets extremely well thanks to its ability to generate cash and its liquid financial structure. According to the ISE closing prices, Hürriyet had a market capitalization of US$ 1.3 billion as of year-end 2007. Hürriyet is a company well-recognized by international investors. As of December 31, 2007, Hürriyet's revenue, net income and paid-in capital were YTL 914 million, YTL 94 million and YTL 421 million, respectively. |
