New York Times Slips To Loss In Q3

(RTTNews) - Newspaper publisher New York Times Co. (NYT) on Thursday reported a loss for the third quarter, reflecting an impairment related to the sale of the New England Media Group that offset a slight increase in revenues.

Looking ahead to the fourth quarter, New York Times forecast circulation revenues to increase in the low single digits, as the company expects to see continued benefit from its digital subscription initiatives as well as from print price increases at The Times in early 2013.

However, the company added that advertising revenue trends remain subject to significant month-to-month volatility and are expected to decline in the low single-digits in the fourth quarter.

The company's net loss for the third quarter was $24.23 million or $0.16 per share, compared to net income of $2.75 million or $0.02 per share in the year-ago period. The latest quarter's results include loss from continuing operations of $0.03 per share, compared with loss of $0.02 per share in the year-ago period.

New York Times said in early August that it agreed to sell New England Media Group, which includes the Boston Globe, for $70 million in cash to an acquisition company owned by John Henry. The company recorded an impairment of $34.3 million in the latest quarter to reflect assets held for sale at fair value less costs to sell.

Excluding severance and a special item, loss from continuing operations for the quarter was $0.01 per share, compared to loss of $0.02 per share in the prior-year period. On average, five analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected the company to report loss of $0.04 per share for the quarter. Analysts' estimates typically exclude one-time items.

However, total revenues for the quarter rose 2 percent to $361.74 million from $355.34 million in the year-ago period. Analysts had a consensus revenue estimate of $417.25 million.

Circulation revenues for the quarter grew 4.8 percent, while advertising revenues declined 2 percent and other revenue decreased 0.8 percent. The company noted that the decline in advertising revenues was the lowest year-on-year decline in three years.

Paid digital subscriptions in the quarter rose 28 percent to about 727,000. Revenues from the company's digital-only subscription packages, e-readers and replica editions increased 29 percent to $37.7 million.

In mid-September, New York Times said its board of directors approved a dividend of $0.04 per share on its Class A and Class B common stock. This is the first quarterly dividend to be paid by the company to its shareholders in nearly five years.

New York Times had suspended payment of the quarterly dividend on its Class A and Class B common stock in February 2009 amid the financial crisis.

In Thursday's regular trading session, NYT is trading at $14.00, up $0.24 or 1.82 percent on a volume of 375,504 shares.