It’s not the Murdoch effect — really.

Longtime Wall Street Journal hedge funds reporter Henny Sender quit the paper last Friday and is into her first day at the Financial Times where she will cover global finance.

Sender was one of several Journal reporters that Rupert Murdoch reportedly approached and asked to stay at the paper even as his global media empire News Corp swallows parent company Dow Jones. Sender, reached by phone at the FT, said Murdoch had nothing to do with her reason to leave after 15 years with Dow Jones.

Here’s what she said: “He asked me to stay, and I was very touched by it. But ultimately it has always been a dream of mine to work at the Financial Times.”

But why now? “It just seemed like the sun and the stars and the moons were aligned.”

We had to ask what it was like getting the hard sell from Murdoch. Short answer: “He was lovely.”

I remember.

(Full disclosure: Sender worked at Reuters, but a long, long time before I showed up here.)