NYT to repay Carlos Slim in August

The New York Times Co. said Wednesday it would fully repay a $250-million loan from Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim in August, faster than previously expected. The newspaper company took out the loan, which carried a hefty 14 percent interest rate, in January 2009 after its advertising revenues took a nosedive amid the financial crisis. It was originally scheduled to pay back Carlos Slim -- the world's richest man, according to Forbes magazine -- in January 2015. Instead the company will repay the loan on August 15, it said in a statement. Last year, it had indicated it would pay Slim back in 2012. "Over the past two years we have significantly strengthened the Times Company's cash position and our considerable and focused efforts have allowed us to prepay the notes far ahead of schedule," chief executive Janet Robinson said in the statement. The early repayment of the loan would save the company $39 million per year in annual interest payments, the company said. Slim, whose assets range from telecommunications to oil and art, has been at the top of the Forbes rich list for two years in a row. The holding controlled by him and his family, Grupo Financiero Inbursa, owns 6.9 percent of class A shares of the The New York Times Co., making him one of the largest individual shareholders in the Times outside of the Sulzbergers, the wealthy US family that controls the newspaper company. Besides its renowned flagship newspaper, The New York Times Company owns the International Herald Tribune, The Boston Globe, 15 other newspapers and various websites. The company's shares gained more than three percent in morning trading on the New York Stock Exchange after the early-repayment plan was announced.