MSM In Decline Update: NYT Profits Drop 52% Y to Y

PittsburghAfterDark

PittsburghAfterDark

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SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) - New York Times Co. on Wednesday reported a 52% decline in third-quarter profit because of expenses related to job cuts announced earlier this year and ongoing weakness at its New England media properties.

New York Times (NYT: 27.25, -0.50, -1.8%) said it took a pre-tax charge of $12.4 million related to a plan announced in May to eliminate about 200 positions. On an after-tax basis, the charge was $7.5 million, or 5 cents a share.

Including the charge, net income plunged to $23.1 million, or 16 cents a share, compared with a profit of $48.3 million, or 33 cents a share, in the year-ago period.

Revenue rose 2.2% to $791.1 million, topping the $787.8 million average estimate of analysts surveyed by Thomson First Call.

The company said it expects to take a charge of $35 million to $45 million over the next three quarters that's related to another round of layoffs announced in September.

Advertising revenue rose 4% to $518.2 million. Excluding About.com, the online information provider it recently acquired, ad revenue was only up 1.3%.

New York Times Co. said a pattern of stronger ad growth at its smaller newspapers than its large markets continued in the third quarter.

Ad revenue at the New England Media Group, which includes the Boston Globe, declined 3% to $111.2 million, while circulation revenue fell 6% to $42.9 million. Lower ad sales reflected "continuing softness in the Boston economy," said Janet Robinson, the company's chief executive, in a statement.

At the New York Times Media Group, ad revenue rose 3% to $272.7 million, while circulation was just about flat at $154.2 million. Ad sales improved at this unit in late September, Robinson said.

Ad revenue rose 4.3% to $88.1 million at the Regional Media Group, which newspapers in smaller markets such as Santa Rosa, Calif., and Wilmington, N.C. Circulation slipped 0.4%.

Newsprint expense rose 3% in the quarter.

Online revenue was again strong for New York Times Co., as it has been throughout the newspaper industry. The News Media Group's Internet properties saw revenue jump 30.5% from the same quarter last year, while About.com's revenue rose about 67%.

At the company's television stations, revenue fell 5.4% to $33.3 million, due to the absence of political and Olympic-related advertising that lifted results a year earlier.

New York Times expects 2005 ad revenue to be up by a low-single-digit percentage over 2004, while circulation revenue is seen being flat to down "slightly."

Newsprint cost per ton is expected to be up by 9-11%.

Shares were down as much as 3% at $26.85 during Wednesday's session.
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Couldn't happen to a bigger POS publication. I look forward to hearing about similar drops from Tribune Media, the Washington Post and LA Slimes.
 
Ya, when publications like the murdoch's boston herald take over I'll be glad to finally get rid of that pesky thing called news. I really like my papers to be indistinguishable from tabloids. Who cares what happens during the mexican election, all I really want to know is if michael jackson sleeps in an air chamber.

The conservative boston herald "newspaper" even hired a reported who got fired from the globe for plagiarism and fabricating stories. What makes it even better is they're the one who broke the story of those actions.

From what I've heard, the new york post isn't any better.
 
[quote name='PittsburghAfterDark']Couldn't happen to a bigger POS publication. I look forward to hearing about similar drops from Tribune Media, the Washington Post and LA Slimes.[/QUOTE]

Rather than speculate, can you tell me why you dislike the NYT?
 
[quote name='evanft']Liberal Media = Not Conservative Propaganda

And the NYP IS just a tabloid.[/QUOTE]

Listen to this man. Have you ever heard radio host Ed Schultz? He's a bleeding heart moderate, but fails to realize that. Our country's ideology has swung so far to the right as a result of a hijacked national dialogue that people in the middle are considered part of the vast left-wing conspiracy.

Try Schultz for a week; he supports the troops, he's pro-union but anti-boycott and anti-job action (figure that one out), he's pro-life, and he's a rabid carnivore (a minor point, but it reflects that anti-PC "I'll do what I want" individualism), and a proud gun owner.

And he's on our local Air America station; as a result, the liberal female Michael Savage (Randy Rhodes) is delayed by three hours.

PAD will respond with only one thing: Jayson Blair. He won't be able to cite anything else than that for diliking the Times, without looking like the kind of person who covers their ears in order to avoid bad news. Our nation cannot talk about fair wages for laborers, universal health care, fair taxation of out wealthier citizens, government scandals, government lies, the failure of war, our international failures, the misdirection in the war on terror, the inappropriateness of administration nominees, or any number of myriad topics without being told to shut up and stop hating America.

We believe that Bill O'Reilly, who has shown his only moderate card in being against the death penalty, and who still believes in boycotting France (?), is the face of moderate America. PAD and the like will never admit to that; it is far easier to mobilize people who believe that they are both threatened immediately as well as the underdog (in terms of access to power, though not numbers). The moment PAD admits that the majority of the press in this country is beholden to the interest of profits and its corporate ownership than some horseshit liberal ideal or agenda, the very same moment that many Americans will cease being fooled that they are truly conservative, and realize they've been chasing a carrot on a stick to the benefit of others for decades.

In the meantime, PAD can discredit NYT all he wants, and instead rely on the drudge report and newsmax as his sources of unbiased information.
 
I think that the government should control all forms of media, it would simplify things for everyone. Hey it worked in China and the chinese people couldnt be happier. Any real american would want more newspapers not less get a clue PAD even if a paper prints trash its still shows free speech not spoon fed goverment steered garbage like certain news organizations today.
 
[quote name='PittsburghAfterDark']Couldn't happen to a bigger POS publication. I look forward to hearing about similar drops from Tribune Media, the Washington Post and LA Slimes.[/QUOTE]

A little more then a year ago, the Washington Post started a new marketing campaign that was designed to halt reducing readership.

The campaign called upon writers and layout artists to produce more McArticles like the ones in USA Today that start and end on the front page. They also cut out most of the political cartoons, reduced the word sizes for stories, lowered the level of vocabulary required to read the stories, and included more photos.

Is it any surprise that these types of changes are happening in a time of increasingly conservative government?
 
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