• All Things Digital, Monday, February 2, 2009 10:01 AM

Pali Research analyst Rich Greenfield has been a longtime advocate for News Corp., but those days are over. He cut his recommendation on the company from a "Buy" to a "Sell" due to CEO Rupert Murdoch's "lack of strategic direction related to News Corp's television station, newspaper and book publishing assets."

Greenfield sees News Corp. as two different business groups. Its film studio, cable networks and MySpace are good assets, and its broadcast TV and newspaper units are bad assets. He once thought the bad group would wither away without pulling down the rest of the company, but now he worries that Murdoch, who loves newspapers, will prop up his money-losers for too long.

Perhaps to address such doubts, News Corp.'s Wall Street Journal is planning to make newsroom cuts this week, according to Portfolio and industry insiders. About 50 jobs are said to be targeted, with the possibility of additional cuts at Dow Jones Newswires and the elimination of one or more Journal bureaus.

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