Media holding company Gannett Co., Inc. (GCI), the publisher of USA Today, reported Tuesday a profit for the first quarter that surged 53 percent from last year, reflecting strong broadcasting and digital results as well as the continued positive impact the access content subscription model in publishing segment. Adjusted earnings per share for the quarter topped analysts' expectations, while quarterly revenues matched their estimates.
"We are very pleased to report a significant increase in earnings per share this quarter. Our all access content subscription model's success benefited our local domestic publishing revenue for the fourth consecutive quarter," President and CEO Gracia Martore said in a statement.
Martore added that, "Core advertising growth and a substantial increase in retransmission revenue contributed to improving results in Broadcasting while Digital segment results continued to reflect CareerBuilder's growing market position."
The McLean, Virginia-based publisher of 82 daily newspapers reported net income of $104.57 million or $0.44 per share for the first quarter, up from $68.22 million or $0.28 per share in the prior-year quarter.
Excluding items, adjusted net income for the quarter was $86.04 million or $0.37 per share, compared to $80.80 million or $0.34 per share in the year-ago quarter.
On average, eight analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected earnings of $0.35 per share for the first quarter. Analysts' estimates typically exclude special items.
Total net operating revenues for the quarter grew 1.6 percent to $1.24 billion from $1.22 billion in the same quarter last year, and matched seven Wall Street analysts' consensus estimate of $1.24 billion.
Publishing revenues for the quarter edged down 0.3 percent to $871.2 million from last year as the all access content subscription model continued to drive circulation revenue growth. Circulation revenue grew 8.6 percent, while advertising revenues declined 4.5 percent from last year.
Revenues from broadcasting were $191.6 million, up 8.7 percent from a year ago, and digital segment revenues grew 3.9 percent to $174.9 million from last year. Meanwhile, company-wide digital revenues surged 26.6 percent.
In Tuesday's regular trading session, GCI is currently trading at $20.91, down $0.12 or 0.57% on a volume of 3.39 million shares.
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