[Updated at 5:40 p.m. ET.] Gannett shares closed at $13.89, down $1.15, or 7.7%, as Wall Street registered its unhappiness with today's first-quarter earnings report. Earlier in the day, GCI traded as low as $13.51, according to Google Finance.]
Gannett reported a profit of $68.2 million, or 28 cents a share, down from $90.5 million, or 37 cents, a year earlier, according to MarketWatch.
Excluding items, such as facility consolidations and workforce restructuring, earnings fell to 34 cents a share from 41 cents. Revenue fell 2.6% to $1.22 billion, according to Corporate's news release.
Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters had most recently forecast earnings of 31 cents on revenue of $1.24 billion.
Investors were disappointed: GCI's stock fell 7.2% in early trading, to $13.96 a share.
Revenue fell 2.6% to $1.2 billion on an 8.4% decline in publishing advertising.
The 23-station broadcasting division was a lone bright spot: Its revenue surged 7.5% to $176.2 million on political advertising during the GOP presidential primaries.
Related: spreadsheet shows quarterly revenue changes by division this quarter and all of 2011.
Gannett reported a profit of $68.2 million, or 28 cents a share, down from $90.5 million, or 37 cents, a year earlier, according to MarketWatch.
Excluding items, such as facility consolidations and workforce restructuring, earnings fell to 34 cents a share from 41 cents. Revenue fell 2.6% to $1.22 billion, according to Corporate's news release.
Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters had most recently forecast earnings of 31 cents on revenue of $1.24 billion.
Investors were disappointed: GCI's stock fell 7.2% in early trading, to $13.96 a share.
Revenue fell 2.6% to $1.2 billion on an 8.4% decline in publishing advertising.
The 23-station broadcasting division was a lone bright spot: Its revenue surged 7.5% to $176.2 million on political advertising during the GOP presidential primaries.
Related: spreadsheet shows quarterly revenue changes by division this quarter and all of 2011.
In addition to the ongoing weakness in print advertising, your spreadsheet shows that the growth in digital is slowing. That's something other old-line media companies have seen, too.
ReplyDeleteFrom http://www.nasdaq.com/article/gannett-q1-profit-down---quick-facts-20120416-00578:
ReplyDelete"(RTTNews.com) - ... Earnings per share, on a GAAP basis were $0.28 for the first quarter of 2012 compared to $0.37 for the first quarter last year.
... Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected the company to report earnings of $0.31 per share for the quarter. Analysts' estimates typically exclude special items."
Ouch!
Wonderful job Gracia!! Your the best!! What a joke 25% earrings slide. Unreal!!!
ReplyDeleteThis is what happens when you run off hard-working dedicated employees who have given 20+ years to an unthankful company. You can expect similar results going forward as GCI is nearly out of seed corn to eat.
ReplyDeleteLEE up 13% today.
ReplyDeleteYou reap what you sow, Gannett.
ReplyDeleteThere is NOTHING about this company that makes its stock worth investing in. If they were smart they would SELL the individual newspapers and stations while they still have public recognition and value.
ReplyDeleteHow do you effectively charge for content that the mom + pop storefront blog down the street gives away.
ReplyDeletePrint is down partly because of the change of focusing sales to digital and choosing to mismanage, and ignore print.
ReplyDeleteHere's the takeaway number for publishing (never mind the accounting mumbo-jumbo): Revenue fell from $930 million to $874 million; expenses stayed the same at $812 million.
ReplyDeletePublishing revenue dropped $56 million, while publishing expenses STAYED THE SAME. So your furloughs amounted to bailing water.
As noted in a number of recent stories about the Titanic: the water pumps could only expel seawater at a rate less than half of the incursion. The pumps are estimated to have kept the doomed ship afloat for an extra hour.
10:29 AM - Warren Buffett is buying up Lee's debt for peanuts. The Sage of Omaha obviously believes in newspapers ... does he own any Gannett?
ReplyDeleteThis is all my fault. If they had laid me off sooner, the numbers would have been better. My apologies to the shareholders.
ReplyDeleteI'm a novice investor, but I do have margin trading enabled on my account. Exactly how would I short GCI? I understand implementing puts and calls, but that's about it.
ReplyDeleteShorting is simple: You borrow a block of the stock (typically from your broker via your margin allowance), sell it and wait for price to drop. Then you buy it back, repay your lender and pocket the difference between your sale and purchase prices. But if the stock rises, you're in trouble. Depending on how fast you have to repay your lender, you can lose a bundle. Naked shorting is the big leagues. Starting with real $ would be like learning to clean a gun while it's loaded. Practice with a shadow portfolio.
ReplyDelete