'Wall Street Journal' to adopt compact size

The Europe and Asia editions of The Wall Street Journal are to switch from a broadsheet to a compact format in the autumn.

The Europe and Asia editions of The Wall Street Journal are to switch from a broadsheet to a compact format in the autumn.

Following in the footsteps of The Independent and The Times, the non-US editions of the global business paper, renowned for its distinctive drawings, will move to the smaller size from 17 October.

The publisher, Dow Jones, hopes to make annual savings of $17m by 2006, through cost savings associated with the compact format and other related savings.

The changes represent a challenge to The Financial Times in its home market. The FT, owned by Pearson, has so far beaten off the challenge from the Journal but a compact rival would be a competitive threat at a time when Pearson is struggling to bring the paper back to profit.

The Journal is also transferring a number of news jobs from Europe and Asia to the US, where it is launching a new weekend edition in September, although it will continue to have a large news team outside the US, of more than 100 journalists.

Advertising volumes fell 30.3 per cent at the Europe edition of the WSJ in March and by nearly 21 per cent at the Asian edition.