News Corp – parent company of Times, Sunday Times and Sun publisher News UK – has blamed a weak print advertising market for a $269m loss in revenues from its news and information services.
New financial figures for the year to the end of June, published today, show the US-based company made just over $5.07bn in revenues from news services last year, down 5 per cent on the year before.
The company, which also owns the Wall Street Journal, New York Post and a string of Australian titles, said advertising revenues from news had fallen by $202m (7 per cent) to £2.61bn over the year.
It said the decline was “reflecting weakness in the print advertising market” as well as a $28m “negative impact” from foreign currency fluctuations and $33m loss from the year being shorter by a week.
Excluding outside factors, News Corp said advertising revenues would have been down 5 per cent year-on-year.
Circulation and subscription revenues fell by $97m (5 per cent) to $2.01bn, the figures show.
This includes $88m of negative impact from foreign currency fluctuations and a $39m loss from the shorter year.
Excluding the impact of negative foreign currency fluctuations and the additional week, circulation and subscription revenues would have increased 1 per cent, News Corp reported.
Adjusted full-year earnings (before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation) for news and information services – which excludes the $280m News Corp paid to settle a lawsuit against its News America Marketing division last year – are down 14 per cent to $429m.
See the full 2017 financial year figures.
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