Financial Times

The London-based global business newspaper, owned by Japan's Nikkei, known for its pink pages and international business reporting.

About Financial Times

The Financial Times, or FT, is a global business newspaper and news service. It covers companies, markets, economics, politics and world affairs, and has a weekend edition with lifestyle pages. Its other products include FT Weekend, the FT Magazine, HTSI (a weekly luxury lifestyle magazine), the personal finance title Investors Chronicle, and specialist titles such as The Banker and FT Adviser. It also publishes the Lex column and runs the FT Business Book of the Year Award, and it has helped create stock market indices such as the FTSE All-Share.

The paper began in January 1888 as the London Financial Guide and became the Financial Times within weeks. It has printed on pink paper since 1893. Brendan Bracken bought it in 1945, Pearson owned it from 1957 until 2015, and Japan's Nikkei has owned it since November 2015. The FT describes its newsroom as independent of its owners' influence, and it is widely seen as a newspaper of record. We did not find a short mission sentence in the pages we read.

In the UK, the FT is based at Bracken House, 1 Friday Street, near St Paul's Cathedral in the City of London. The building is Grade II listed and was designed by Sir Albert Richardson in 1959; the FT returned to it after more than 30 years away, following a refurbishment that began in 2016. About 475 journalists work for the FT, and around 110 of them are based outside the UK, so the largest part of the newsroom is in Britain. The FT passed 1.3 million subscribers in 2023, mostly digital.

The roles behind the FT are varied. Reporters and editors cover everything from banking to technology; data journalists and graphics teams make the charts the FT is known for; product, design and engineering teams build the apps; and marketing, subscriptions, events, finance and legal teams support the business. The FT Edit app, launched in 2022, aimed to reach younger readers. Under editor Gordon Newton from 1949 the paper recruited graduates directly, which is a historical fact about its approach.

FT Knowledge also offers educational courses such as "Introducing the City". A good habit is reading the FT's headlines to get used to business language, whatever job you want. Check the FT's official website for up-to-date information.

What they do

• {'desc': 'News, analysis and opinion on companies, markets and the economy.', 'title': 'Business journalism'}
• {'desc': 'The Banker, FT Adviser, Investors Chronicle and others.', 'title': 'FT Specialist titles'}
• {'desc': 'Courses such as "Introducing the City".', 'title': 'FT Knowledge'}

Key facts

• Launched in January 1888; printed on pink paper since 1893 (Wikipedia)
• Headquarters Bracken House, 1 Friday Street, London (Wikipedia)
• About 475 journalists, about 110 of them outside the UK (Wikipedia)
• 1.3 million subscribers in 2023, 1.2 million digital (Wikipedia)

Website: www.ft.com