The verdict is in and the answer is: no sale. Reed Elsevier (NYSE: RUK) has announced that its torturous, nine-month campaign to sell the B2B magazine division is over. Reed announced to the stock market this afternoon that it has “terminated discussions with potential bidders” and that due to the poor economic outlook, shareholders would get more value by the company hanging on to the Farmers’ Weekly and Variety publisher. RBI now remains separate business and will be run by RBI UK CEO Keith Jones as overall CEO of the company.

SEE ALSO: RBI Timeline: How The Non-Sale Unfolded In Links

But it’s still not over: Reed wants to sell RBI in the “medium term when conditions are more favourable” and in meantime RBI will be “structured and managed” to make it as profitable as possible. And that normally means redundancies, magazine sell-offs or both. As former CEO of RBI’s US division Jim Casella has suggested, a broken-up RBI would be more attractive to investors and easier to sell. These are all issues Ian Smith will be tackling when he starts as Reed CEO on January 1.

Outgoing Reed CEO Sir Crispin Davies says the decision was one of realism: “We believe the business has significantly more value to our shareholders than could be realised in a transaction at this time.” He says that RBI accounts for less than ten percent of Reed’s operating profits and that it won’t get in the way of Reed’s overall goals—and he almost struck a positive note by saying the company now had “clarity” and could move on after the non-sale. But he would surely agree that this is not exactly how the company planned it. Reed wanted rid of RBI ASAP and repeated its reasons again today by saying that RBI’s “advertising revenue model and the inherent cyclicality” didn’t fit with the rest of Reed’s subscription-based magazines and information services. More on RBI after the jump….