INVESTMENTS

Equity Method Investments

As of September 25, 2016, our investments in joint ventures consisted of equity ownership interests in the following entities:



Company	Approximate % Ownership
Donohue Malbaie Inc.	49	%
Madison Paper Industries	40	%
Women in the World Media, LLC	30	%

We have investments in Donohue Malbaie Inc. (“Malbaie”), a Canadian newsprint company, Madison Paper Industries (“Madison”), a partnership that operated a supercalendered paper mill in Maine, and Women in the World Media, LLC, a live-event conference business.

Our Company and UPM-Kymmene Corporation (“UPM”), a Finnish paper manufacturing company, are partners through subsidiary companies in Madison. The Company’s 40% ownership of Madison is through an 80%-owned consolidated subsidiary which owns 50% of Madison. UPM owns 60% of Madison, including a 10% interest through a 20% noncontrolling interest in the consolidated subsidiary of the Company. In March 2016, UPM announced the closure of the paper mill, which occurred in May 2016. During the first nine months of 2016, we recognized a $46.7 million loss from joint ventures, of which $43.5 million related to the announced closure of the paper mill. Our proportionate share of the loss is reduced by the 20% noncontrolling interest. As a result of the mill closure, we wrote our investment down to zero and recorded a liability of $31.9 million, reflecting our share of the losses incurred to date by Madison. These amounts are presented in “Accrued expenses and other” in our Condensed Consolidated Balance Sheets.

The Company’s joint venture in Madison is currently being liquidated and a plan is in place to sell assets (including hydro power assets) at the mill site. We believe the proceeds from the sale of the hydro power assets will be more than sufficient to cover Madison’s obligations and therefore allow us to reverse our liability, and we do not currently expect that the Company will be required to use significant cash in the wind down of this investment.

We received no distributions from our equity method investments during the three- and nine-month periods ended September 25, 2016 and September 27, 2015.

We purchase newsprint from Malbaie, and previously purchased supercalendered paper from Madison, at competitive prices. Such purchases totaled $3.7 million and $2.7 million in the third quarter of 2016 and 2015, respectively, and $10.3 million and $8.8 million for the first nine-months of 2016 and 2015, respectively.

The following table presents summarized income statement information for Madison, which follows a calendar year:



	For the Nine Months Ended
(In thousands)	September 30, 2016			September 30, 2015
Revenues	$	40,523		$	93,490
Costs and expenses:
Cost of sales	68,039			84,445
General and administrative	66,056			15,363
	134,095			99,808
Operating loss	(93,572		)	(6,318		)
Other income	4			3
Net loss	$	(93,568	)	$	(6,315	)

Cost Method Investments

The aggregate carrying amounts of cost method investments included in “Miscellaneous assets’’ in our Consolidated Balance Sheets were $13.9 million and $11.9 million for September 25, 2016 and December 27, 2015, respectively.