How secure is NYT?

Not as much as you might think. Consider this lede on the newspaper's Web site:

The New York Times Company reported a 51.4 percent decline in third-quarter profit on Thursday and swung to a loss on continuing operations as deeper-than-expected expense cuts could not keep pace with declining revenue.

Declining revenue, deeper-than-expected cuts - sound familiar? Henry Blodget at Clusterstock says the numbers look so bad that the company is in danger of defaulting on its debt, especially with advertising revenues likely to keep falling (perhaps a lot). His headline: "New York Times running on fumes."

The company has only $46 million of cash. It appears to be burning more than it is taking in--and plugging the hole with debt. Specifically, it is funding operations by rolling over short-term loans--the kind that banks worldwide are cancelling or making prohibitively expensive to save their own skins.

Of course, it's all relative. Total debt is $1.1 billion, mere pocket change next to Tribune's $12.5 billion.