Media Companies

Few groups, lots of power

El Comercio is the most powerful in the industry. It owns 16 of the 40 most important media --representing 40%-- that were analyzed. The sum total of the income of all the other groups does not equal that of El Comercio and its subsidiaries.

The selection of media groups was made on the basis of the total annual income declared. They have been ordered by economic importance.

El Comercio is the only group that has a significant share in several sectors (television, print media and Internet). Other groups have however diversified and have small shares in the other sectors.  These include the RPP Group, Corporación Universal, the Peruvian state and the La República Group. All privately owned media have interests in other types of business outside the media: real estate, digital business, education, entertainment, publishing, advertising, investment funds etc.

It is not easy to identify the businesses related to the media groups. El Comercio Group is the only company that has a page identifying all its subsidiaries. Others by contrast try to conceal the origin of the ownership of the main business, It is necessary to make several leaps to discover the true owner of the ATV Group.  Enfoca Safi, the owner of Latina TV, is owned by a company registered in Grand Cayman Island, meaning that its real shareholders cannot be identified.  Some of the companies behind the ownership of Panamericana Televisión have implausibly small capital for proprietors of a media channel.

It is also notable that some groups have associated in order to increase audience share and advertising sales: Latina Televisión with Panamerica Televisión and Grupo ATV with América Televisión, of the El Comercio Group.

State-owned media have been separated in one group for the purposes of the analysis.

The groups lack transparency in regard to the interests of their owners.