Bulletin: In surprise, Gannett doubles dividend; announces targeted $100 million stock buyback, as Q2 earnings per share fall to 58 cents vs. 61 cents

The just-announced dividend boost, to 8 cents from 4 cents, came moments ago in this announcement, which also discloses the equally surprising resumption of a share repurchase plan.

Here's the second-quarter earnings statement. Excluding special items, earnings per share were 58 cents vs. 61 cents a year ago. That's a penny higher than forecast by Wall Street analysts, in a survey by Thomson Financial.

Revenue totaled $1.33 billion, down 2.2% from a year ago, meeting Wall Street's forecast, on another steep decline in publishing advertising, which fell 6.5%.

During the quarter, Corporate once more slashed payrolls, by laying off 700 U.S. newspaper workers, while also ordering another round of unpaid furloughs for certain highly paid employees.

Investors rallied around the news: In pre-market trading, GCI's stock was recently up 5.2%, or 70 cents, to $14.80 a share, according to Google Finance.

Dubow

In the statement, Chairman and CEO Craig Dubow says:

"Our results for the quarter reflect the positive impact of our ongoing efforts to focus on our customers and to meet their business and marketing needs across our platforms. This resulted in higher digital revenues for the quarter in each of our business segments. Company-wide digital revenues were up 13% compared to last year. Broadcasting segment revenue was up slightly overcoming the significant political advertising spends of last year.

"Each of our business segments was solidly profitable, due in part to our commitment to align our expenses with revenue opportunities. We accomplished this despite the continued challenging economic environments in many markets and the impact of the crisis in Japan on the supply chain and inventories for autos and consumer electronics.

"We also announced today that the board of directors has approved doubling the dividend and resuming share repurchases. We are able to take those actions because of the confidence we have in our long term growth prospects, our ability to consistently generate cash flow and the strength of our balance sheet."

The dividend increase is the first since the board slashed the payout 90% in February 2009, when the company was veering toward bankruptcy as the Great Recession enveloped the newspaper industry.

Dubow and COO Gracia Martore are scheduled to discuss the quarterly results and other developments with stock analysts during a 10 a.m. ET conference call. The call is open to the public on a listen-only basis; details here.

I plan to live-blog the conference.