Three weeks after it claimed that it was the “number one financial news platform in India”, Moneycontrol – a business news website part of the Network 18 group – announced in newspaper ads that it “beat the Economic Times hands down in all traffic parameters”.

While the ad was carried on the front page by the Indian Express and the Hindustan TImes on Wednesday and Tuesday, respectively, the Times of India gave it a miss – the Economic Times is owned by the Times Group.

Interestingly, the Hindustan Times as well as the Indian Express have sister publications focussing on business reportage – Mint and Financial Express, respectively. The Calcutta edition of the Telegraph and the Chennai edition of the Hindu did not carry the ad.

Moneycontrol’s claims were based on the ComScore Multiplatform (India) February 2022 report. It also claimed that the engagement and time spent on its platform was four times ET. The statement issued by the portal on March 25 claimed that the website surpassed ET in terms of unique visitor traffic with 42.39 million visits as opposed to the latter’s 41.65 million.

ET and Moneycontrol have separate sections for premium content and the advertisement by the latter may be directed at both advertisers and subscribers.