News Corp. Revs Dip On Newspaper Declines

 

• by Erik Sass @eriksass1, August 13, 2015, 11:06 AM

Now entering its third year as an independent company, following its spinoff from Fox in June 2013, News Corporation is still struggling with the same long-term decline in print revenues affecting other newspaper publishers. However, the company also noted positive trends in its digital real estate and book publishing businesses.
News Corp.’s total revenues fell 2% from $2.19 billion in the second quarter of 2014 to $2.14 billion in the second quarter of 2015 (the fourth quarter of its fiscal year). When the impact of foreign exchange fluctuations is excluded, total revenues were down 1%, due to the continuing drop in newspaper advertising and circulation revenues.

The company’s newspaper publishing revenues fell 10% from $1.56 billion to $1.4 billion over this period, as ad revenues tumbled 13% and circ slipped 5%; when the impact of currency fluctuations are excluded, total revenues were down 2%.

The newspaper slump was partially offset by growth in other areas, with bright spots including digital real estate revenue, which jumped 67% to $190 million, powered by the acquisition of Move. Book publishing revenues were also up 8% to $390 million, due principally to the acquisition of Harlequin.
Move’s traffic in the second quarter increased 42% year-over-year to around 45 million, powered by an 80% increase in mobile users.

As noted, other big newspaper publishers have recently posted similar quarterly results. The New York Times Co. saw total revenues fall 1.55% to $383 million in the second quarter.  Tribune’s total revenues fell 4.7% to $410 million, McClatchy Co.’s fell 8.7% to $262.4 million, and Gannett’s also fell 8.7% to $727.1 million.