Berkshire Hathaway has sharply increased its stake in the New York Times, a move that signals faith in the publisher’s transformation from print to a subscription-driven digital business. The bet comes as the Times builds multiple paid products, racks up millions of registered users, and shows the kind of recurring revenue that long-term investors prize. That combination of scale, habit-forming content, and a fresh corporate guard has Wall Street taking notice.
For decades, owning a newspaper was shorthand for slow decline: print circulation slipped and advertising went to big tech. The New York Times quietly rewrote that script by turning attention and content into a reliable digital subscription engine rather than relying on printed papers and ad volume. Investors who once dismissed the industry are now reassessing what a modern media company can deliver.
The Times reported roughly 13 million paid subscribers this past quarter, and management points to a far larger audience that visits its sites and apps. “We’ve got 50 million to 100 million people who are coming to our sites and apps every week, much more than the 13 million and change subscribers,” Kopit Levien said. “We’ve got a huge trove of podcasts and e-mails that people watch, listen to, read on a daily basis. And we’ve got over 150 million registered users and counting.”
That mix of journalism and lifestyle content is no accident. The company leans on games, cooking, sports, and product reviews to keep readers returning each day, stacking multiple reasons to stay connected. Wordle, Connections, and other interactive offerings draw tens of millions of play sessions, while The Athletic anchors a deep sports journalism operation that many fans will pay for year after year.
Berkshire’s move was dramatic: the firm tripled its position to roughly 15.1 million shares, pushing the holding to more than $1.1 billion and placing ownership near 9.4%. The increase arrived during Greg Abel’s early months as CEO, a transition that signals Berkshire’s next chapter while also keeping Warren Buffett’s investing instincts in play. The size of the purchase made it obvious this was not a casual trade.
Buffett actually first bought into the Times in late 2025, starting with an initial position of about 5.1 million shares, and the ramp-up since then has drawn attention. The latest increase looks like a coordinated decision at the top of Berkshire, suggesting that both the old guard and new leadership see durable economics in the media company. That alignment adds credibility beyond the headline numbers.
It is also a reversal from earlier thinking. Buffett long owned local papers and once held stakes in bigger titles, but he later sold many local papers after calling some of them “toast.” That skeptical view of print was understandable in an era of relentless ad migration, but the digital subscription pivot has changed the calculus for large, national outlets that turned their brands into habit-forming products.
Subscribe-driven media behaves more like consumer staples than fading print shops: people pay for crosswords, recipes, in-depth features and dedicated sports coverage, and those payments recur year after year. That kind of predictable revenue is precisely the durability investors like Berkshire chase in names such as Coca-Cola and Apple, and it helps explain why the Times now sits in a different valuation bucket.
Analysts are modeling continued revenue and earnings growth: forecasts show revenue shifting over the next few years and adjusted earnings per share moving higher. If the stock trades at about 25 times forward earnings, below its recent five-year average, some models suggest meaningful upside within an 18-month window. Among the analysts covering the company, several prefer buy over hold, and price targets imply additional room to run from current levels.
The practical lesson for investors is that industries evolve and old labels can mislead. A publisher that sells consistent habits to millions of customers can look a lot like a classic, durable holding. When Buffett and his successor agree on a billion-dollar bet, the rest of Wall Street tends to take notes, and that attention alone can reshape a narrative about an industry once written off.
