At the time of his investment in Blic, Lupšić had strong ties to Milošević's wife Mira Marković and her party Yugoslav Left (JUL).

The decision turned out to be a business winner in the short term as circulation rapidly grew to 200,000 copies a day, but it also drew the ire of the Milošević authorities.

The holiday issue still appeared on newsstands in projected circulation as some of it got printed at Borba and the rest in privately owned ABC Produkt.

Forty three journalists employed at Blic immediately publicly distanced themselves from the issue, and editor-in-chief Manjo Vukotić and his deputy Cvijetin Milivojević resigned in protest.

The most controversial part of the issue was the pro-government op-ed piece under the headline "Nećemo da podstičemo nasilje" (We won't encourage violence) signed by Peter Kolbel who wrote it claiming to represent the paper's owners.

As a response, in December 1996, the journalists and editors formed their own newspaper Demokratija that had the support of opposition Democratic Party (DS).

[10] In April 1998, Blic experienced another fragmentation of its staff when due to disagreements with owner Aca Lupšić over revenue sharing, editor-in-chief Manjo Vukotić decided to step out on his own.

In November 2000, shortly after the overthrow of Slobodan Milošević in Serbia, German publishing firm Gruner + Jahr announced its purchase of 49% stake in Blic Press d.o.o.

Predrag Mihailović was appointed director and editor-in-chief of Sportal, while Marko Stjepanović became the editor-in-chief of Blic In early 2006, Blic created a storm of controversy by claiming in its 4 February 2006 issue that the 11 January arrest of Dejan Simić, National Bank of Serbia vice-governor (who was taken in red-handed at his apartment while accepting a €100,000 bribe from Vladimir Zagrađanin of SPS), actually had a completely different background from what the police and Serbian government authorities told the public.

The newspaper alleged that Dušan Lalić, an NBS employee and deputy PM Miroljub Labus' son-in-law, was actually the individual behind the bribing.

The story further alleged that deputy PM Labus spent an entire night convincing Prime Minister Vojislav Koštunica not to prosecute his son-in-law.

And finally, the story also accused Serbian Interior Minister Dragan Jočić of stopping the police investigation from climbing up the chain of command and thus preventing the arrests of NBS governor Radovan Jelašić and the above-mentioned Dušan Lalić, as well as SPS' Ivica Dačić who was present in the mentioned apartment minutes before the police stormed in.

The paper voiced its fear that the minority coalition government, which held a shaky 5-seat parliamentary support at the time, would fall as Jočić's motivation for disrupting the thorough police action.

Conducted by journalist Nenad Jaćimović, the focus of the Blic interview was on cigarette smuggling operations through Serbia during the 1990s and its political fallout that continues to this day.

[14] Knežević further alleged that since the regime change in Serbia, Đukanović and Subotić needed a "friendly" government in Belgrade and to that end tried their best for years to reach a deal with Serbian president Boris Tadić and his circle.

After allegedly getting nowhere with Tadić, according to Knežević, they then turned their attention to other players on the Serbian political scene such as Tomislav Nikolić and Aleksandar Vučić who met with Đukanović and Subotić during October 2007 in Paris' Ritz Hotel.

In the same response, Knežević also provided further details of the murders of Radovan "Badža" Stojičić, Jusuf "Jusa" Bulić, Vanja Bokan, Goran Žugić, Darko "Beli" Raspopović, and Blagota "Baja" Sekulić (all of which he claimed are connected to cigarette smuggling with the murders of Stojičić, Bulić, and Bokan directly ordered and approved by Stanišić, Subotić, and Đukanović) by directly naming the individuals that carried them out as well as those that ordered them.

Thanks to Blic's detailed reporting, the case gained significant public attention, culminating in Jutka's conviction and prison sentence.

Another high-profile investigation by Blic involved Miroslav Mika Aleksić, a children's acting coach in Belgrade, accused of raping and sexually abusing multiple underage students.

CEPROM's research highlights that Blic's readership is directly linked to its subscription potential, setting it apart as a unique leader in both categories, occupying the top spot.