MEXICAN billionaire Carlos Slim is wheeling and dealing his way through the media world.
According to people familiar with the matter, Slim is sinking more money into The New York Times Co., doubling his current 7 percent stake, while also visiting the offices of Newsweek, the Washington Post-owned newsweekly that was put up for sale earlier this week.
The expanded investment in the Times makes Slim its largest independent shareholder, after the previous biggest shareholder, Phil Falcone‘s hedge fund Harbinger Capital, sold 4.75 million shares last month.
Slim already has deep ties to the Times as a result of his $250 million, high-interest loan to the company in January 2009 and the warrants he holds that enable him to buy up to 18 percent of the company’s common stock.
The Times declined to comment. Slim did not respond to a request for comment.
At the same time that he’s getting in deeper with the Times, sources said Slim also met with Newsweek executives on Wednesday.
Slim’s visit adds to the intrigue surrounding a comment made earlier this week by Newsweek Editor Jon Meacham, who said that once word began to circulate that the magazine he runs was for sale, he received phone calls from two billionaires interested in buying the title.
According to people familiar with the matter, Slim was not one of those billionaires.
Slim’s apparent interest in Newsweek would represent a reversal of fortune for a magazine that some watchers predicted would be difficult to sell.
The title has struggled, losing $28.1 million last year, after slashing by more than 1 million the number of copies it promises advertisers it will sell, known as the rate base.
Compounding matters has been a redesign that moved the magazine away from covering breaking news to mimic The Economist in style, but failed to connect with readers.
The Washington Post said it would not comment on the sale until the process was complete.
Bunny moves
Playboy seems to be making some degree of progress as new CEO Scott Flanders slashes costs and cuts deals to outsource operations.
But the company has yet to return to profitability.
Playboy said it posted a first-quarter loss of $1 million for the three months ended March 31, compared with a net loss of $13.7 million in the quarter earlier.
Print and digital operations narrowed their losses to $1.1 million this quarter, compared with losses of $3.6 million last year, even as revenue in the group fell 30 percent to $18.2 million. The magazine’s revenue took a big hit during the quarter, falling 48 percent to $7.1 million
Many of Playboy’s back-office operations, including circulation and ad sales, were farmed out to American Media Inc. last year.
After reducing its frequency last year to 11, Playboy said it will return to publishing 12 issues this year, in part reflecting stronger newsstand sales due to the link up with AMI.
The licensing group, a cornerstone of Flanders’ strategy since he took over the CEO role from Christie Hefner, is showing some signs of life. That part of the business recorded a 17 percent increase to $6.5 million in the first quarter.
“With our expenses better under control, we are focusing our energies on effectively executing our business strategy,” Flanders said, adding that the goal is to “transition Playboy to a brand management company, and our first priority is to outsource, partner or license those of our operations that can be more efficiently handled by other compa nies.”
David Bank, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets who follows the company said, “The cost-cutting on the magazine and TV business don’t signal the big turn yet. It’s started, but we haven’t seen the big payoff.”
Bank predicted those payoffs would happen by the fourth quarter.
Among the projects in the works is a Playboy resort and casino in Macau, known as the Las Vegas of China, and a less-erotic version of the digital product that could pass muster in an office environment.
Sutton’s day
Ginger Sutton, associate publisher at Woman’s Day, has been promoted to vice president and publisher of the Woman’s Day Brand Group. She reports to the Woman’s Day Chief Brand Officer Carlos Lamadrid.
The company also said it is going to toss out the recipes and devote its entire June issue to the topic of men. keith.kelly@nypost.com