La prensa acaba de publicar la noticia.

Questions & Answers about La prensa acaba de publicar la noticia.

Why do we use the present tense acaba when the translation is "has just published" in the past?
This is how the acabar de + infinitive structure works. Even though it describes an action completed in the recent past, the verb acabar is conjugated in the present tense to mean "have/has just done something".
Does acabar de always have to be followed by an infinitive like publicar?
Yes! When you use acabar de to say someone "just did" an action, the action itself stays in its unconjugated infinitive form. You will never conjugate the second verb in this structure.
Why does la prensa use the singular verb acaba if the press is a group of people?
La prensa is a collective noun. Even though it represents a whole group of media companies or journalists, the word itself is singular, just like la familia (the family). Because of this, it uses the singular verb form.
The translation says "the news", but la noticia is singular. Should I use las noticias?
In Spanish, a single news story or piece of news is singular: la noticia. If they published multiple stories or a whole broadcast, you would use the plural las noticias. English uses "news" for both, which is why it translates this way.

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