Nonetheless, "Evenimentul zilei" remained "The biggest thorn in [Adrian] Nastase's side" (Gallagher, 2005) throughout the 2004 Romanian elections. Ten days after Năstase's defeat in the 13 December 2004 runoff elections, Ringier group moved the "EZ" editor-in-chief, Dan Turturică, to Bacău (officially, to look into the possibility of starting a free newspaper there) and began changing the editorial policy, to become a tabloid. As a response, 80 journalists signed a protest against these decisions and organized rallies in front of the Swiss and EU embassies. Subsequent negotiations were unsuccessful and on 4 January 2005, 30 journalists resigned, in addition to another five that resigned several days earlier. Paid circulation dropped at least 40% from a high of over 100,000. (Gallagher, 2005)  In 2010 Ringier sold its shares in the paper to Bobby Paunescu. In 2019, the newspaper ceased to exist on paper after 8650 numbers. From 1 January 2020, the team moved exclusively online.