For more than a week after the phone hacking scandal broke about his head, Rupert Murdoch kept his counsel. There were grunts at reporters when he went out in public, first in Idaho and then near his apartment in London's Mayfair. In public relations terms, his refusal to comment gave out all the wrong signals. He appeared to be on the back foot. It suggested lack of control, not strength of purpose.

Despite the decisiveness of his actions – most obviously closing the News of the World and withdrawing the BSkyB bid – a mute Murdoch no longer seemed to be master of his own fate. In a vacuum, journalists were bound to speculate, as he will have known. So the gossip swirled. And the most potent rumour was that he was about to dispose of News International itself. There was logic to the argument. If the News of the World was closed because it was toxic, then it followed that the whole division was toxic too.

Seen from the perspective of the US-based parent company, News Corporation, the Wapping outpost seemed both irrelevant and dangerous. Why not cut off the gangrenous limb to ensure the poison did not spread to News Corp's heart?

Media analysts and commentators, including myself, opined in print and on TV and radio about the likelihood of this happening. The speculation was boosted by a story in the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) that told of Murdoch meeting "a tight-knit group of advisers" to weigh the possibilities of a sale. This was considered to be a big clue. After all, the WSJ is not only regarded as a credible business paper, it is part of the News Corp empire and is therefore considered to have the inside track on its own company's affairs.

The Murdoch of old

The story said a Wapping sale was one of "a variety of strategic options on the table" in order to stem the fallout and to map out a future for the company. It noted that despite Murdoch's opposition to such a move, News Corp had "informally explored" whether there might be any potential buyers. None were found. The only quote from the paper's source should have dampened speculation: "It was basically one of those things where it was talked about for maybe two to five minutes and Rupert would say, 'no way'."

But the conditional tense implied that the source was talking about a conversation in the past, not the present. The report contained another telling sentence: "The company may revisit the idea of selling, or spinning off, News International over the next six months."

The next day, Murdoch had clearly had enough. Aware that the WSJ story might get legs, he gave an interview to the Journal in which he showed a pugnacious form redolent of the Murdoch of old. Aside from promising to quash the lies when he faces the Commons select committee tomorrow, he said reports of a likely sale of his Wapping papers were "pure rubbish … pure and total rubbish". For good measure, he added: "Give it the strongest possible denial you can give."

Though that sounds pretty convincing, it is not as definitive as it might seem. For one thing, as shown by the swift movement of events in the past two weeks, he is no longer master of his own fate. If once-loyal readers start to turn their backs in larger numbers than has already happened, and if major advertisers refuse to purchase space in the three remaining Wapping titles, he would have to reconsider his position.

Murdoch knows the future is digital, but he has an emotional attachment to print – especially to the Sun, the reliable source of profits that helped to found his empire. But there are strong voices within News Corp – including his son, James – who are not so wedded to print.

It's as well to recall what James said in a speech in Barcelona in 2009: "In the business of ideas, which is the business we are in, we do think journalism plays a role, and we do think there are business models there that will make a lot of sense, albeit perhaps not at the scale of some of our broadcasting businesses and other entertainment businesses. Is it going to be as big a role? No. Structurally, television is vastly more profitable and a big opportunity."

It seemed like a promise more than a hint. And business logic is on his side. The Times loses pots of money. The Sunday Times, once a guaranteed profit-generator, has been a loss-maker for at least the past two years; in January, they reported a combined pre-tax loss of £45m for the 12 months to June 2010. It is undeniable that the Sun makes money – the same filing reported pre-tax profits of £88.6m together with the News of the World – but can it go on supporting the other two titles as sales revenue slips, especially if advertisers walk away?

Compared to the profits that roll in from BSkyB, even with a mere 39% share (£855m annually on the July 2010 figures, the most recent available), News International is a commercial minnow with little prospect of improving its financial performance. Indeed, it may get much worse as the phone hacking scandal is not going away quickly: the police investigation is likely to last for two years, there are increasing numbers of lawsuits from hacking victims to be settled, and the public is bound to grow more sceptical about any Murdoch-related enterprise (except BSkyB).

News Corp shareholders lack voting power because Murdoch has that tied up, but it doesn't mean they have no power at all to effect changes. They have indulged their boss's sentimental attachment to printers' ink, but tolerance is wearing thin and some share the view of stockbroking analyst Michael Nathanson of Nomura, who said last week that News Corp should reconsider its ownership of News International, since the hacking scandal ruined the BSkyB deal. He said: "We hope this is a turning point for the company's strategy and asset allocation, as the ownership of highly inconsequential newspaper assets has forced the dropping of a strategically important asset."

Highly inconsequential newspaper assets, eh? That's the no-nonsense language of commercial reality. Murdoch, like virtually every buccaneering media mogul past and present, is not motivated by providing shareholder value. People who buy his stock have always had to accept a bumpy ride even before the hacking scandal turned it into a car crash.

Willing buyers

So all that talk about a sale six months down the line may have something to it. The unthinkable might be thinkable after all. The big stumbling block, however, is finding a willing and credible buyer for all or any of the titles. Who has pockets deep enough to fund the Times and Sunday Times? Who has the skills to pilot the country's largest-selling paper, the Sun, from print to online? Or to oversee the infancy of a possible Sun on Sunday, expected to launch in August (and to face competition, according to Reuters, from an Associated Newspapers red-top)?

The Independent has been lucky enough to fall into the hands of a super-rich Russian businessman, Alexander Lebedev, and his increasingly influential son, Evgeny. There is no suggestion that he would want to add the Times to his stable, and he would surely fall foul of competition regulations anyway. Maybe there is another wealthy Russian – Roman Abramovich, perhaps – who would like to buy a loss-making newspaper institution.

Perhaps a media-friendly sheikh may consider it – such as Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa (the emir of Qatar), who funds al-Jazeera, or Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed al-Nahyan, who owns the Abu Dhabi Media Investment Corporation, which is in bed with BSkyB over the launch of Arabia Sky News. Perhaps one of China's new billionaires may take a punt. Closer to home, the Daily Mail & General Trust might fancy adding two upmarket titles to its middle-market pairing. Again, a competition hurdle would have to be jumped.

The same would be true if DMGT went in the other direction and picked up the Sun. Oh yes, and Richard Desmond, who has said that he would one day own the Sun. I cannot envisage Murdoch selling his favourite paper to Desmond, and I would imagine the Sun's staff would have a collective heart attack if any such deal was seriously considered.

In truth, looked at in the context of what's good for the three papers as distinct from what's good for News Corp, Murdoch remains the best owner. How about that!