Cost-cutting began affecting the initiatives the paper had started in the 1990s. In June 2005, the "Mercury News" closed its Hanoi bureau. On October 21, it also announced the closure of and sale of "Viet Mercury" to a group of Vietnamese-American businessmen; however, the deal fell through, and "Viet Mercury" published its final issue on November 11, 2005. was effectively replaced by , which consisted of content syndicated from Knight Ridder–owned "Contra Costa Times" and translated into Spanish by an outsourcing firm in Mexico.