earnings calls

SVP-CFO Jay Rasulo told analysts Thursday that “at the ABC Network, quarter-to-date scatter pricing is pacing in mid-teens above upfront levels. ESPN ad sales are pacing down modestly and ABC Family ad sales are pacing up high single digits. TV station ad sales are pacing up in single digits as well.”

“All of our categories — financial, restaurants, services, medical and media — are all up for December, which is encouraging since they had such displacement in October,” EVP-Television Scott Blumenthal told analysts today. “They have re-spent their dollars toward the end of the year, which gives us encouragement for the future.”

“Pretty incredible,” says CBS CEO Leslie Moonves of the million-dollar local spot in a third-quarter earnings call with analysts. And spots in the network broadcast of the big game have sold for more than $4 million, he says. CBS scatter is “very strong…accelerating as we speak,” he says, and retrans fees and reverse comp from affiliates are expected to continue to drive revenue growth in coming years.

“At our broadcast business, our results were mixed this fall,” said President-COO Chase Carey in Tuesday’s conference call with Wall Street analysts. “On the positive side, we continue to be on track with our goal of building a dual revenue stream business through both retransmission and reverse compensation with our affiliates. However, our fall entertainment launches have been below our expectations and a four-game World Series was clearly not what we had hoped for.”

After announcing yesterday that his company is adding five stations to its portfolio, Nexstar President Perry Sook today said that having recently refinanced its balance sheet with both a new senior loan package and a bond sale, the company now enjoys a lower cost of capital and additional flexibility. “Which allows us to more efficiently look at acquiring other stations in similarly accretive transactions,” he told analysts.

President-CEO Colleen Brown tells analysts “we monitor how much of our spectrum we are using, and we are completely full-up. So … economically, I can’t see that there is a way — we’ve run this many different ways — to participate.”

The company is paying out a $1-per-share special dividend to shareholders, in addition to the 60 cents per year the company already pays in quarterly installments. Sinclair execs tell analysts that fourth quarter net broadcast revenues are expected to be up 48.3% to 49.4% from a year ago to a range of $268.1 million to $270.1 million.

Management is telling investors that 4Q revenues should be up 36% to 41% to a range of $115 million to $119 million.

For the fourth quarter, Belo is projecting that total spot revenues will be up 11% to 13% over a year ago. Political revenue, which was only $5.9 million in 4Q of 2011, is expected to be in a range of $29 million to $30 million. That will take the political total for full year 2012 to $58 million to $59 million, up from $55.6 million in 2010, the most recent political year.

“We’ve been very active on the TV side, but we haven’t been able to close a transaction — yet,” says Chairman-CEO Stephen Lacy in today’s call with analysts. Looking ahead to the current quarter, Meredith is projecting that total company revenues should be up by a percentage in the high teens, led by growth of more than 20% in TV.

The return of advertisers that have been crowded out by the frenzy of political spots is expected to deliver a boost in late November and into December.

Media General President-CEO Marshall Morton, who is retiring at the end of the year, had a number of positives to report to analysts now that his company has become a pure play TV broadcaster. One was that the company is poised to see 25%-28% revenue growth in the year’s final quarter.

And that’s on top of a just-announced record 3Q driven by political, Olympics and retrans. And Gannett Broadcasting President David Lougee said the TV division’s year-long “Olympic sales transformation process” paid off in 3Q. “We brought a lot of new local advertisers and partners into the Olympics and are already working with them on packages for the Sochi [Russia] Winter Olympics in 16 months.”

CEO Perry Sook says that while it will continue to look for acquisitions that make sense, it is also “engaged in discussions to sell some of our smaller, non-strategic assets and believe that can be done at accretive multiples to the company as well.”

By replacing Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy with home-grown shows, it will control all of the access ad positions. Plus, it hopes to syndicate Let’s Ask America and The List to non-Scripps stations as well to generate more revenue.

In the company’s quarterly conference call, Joe Ianniello, EVP-CFO, said its Local Broadcasting unit is pacing up high single digits for 3Q, led by the TV stations, which are pacing up in the teens. That growth by the O&O TV group is “driven by political, auto and the entertainment category.”

COO Steve Marks tells analysts that “political is expected to be up 85% through the third quarter and we believe that we will exceed the $34 million of political reported in the fourth quarter of 2008. And yes, that 85% number is a same-station number.

“We’re way ahead of where we thought we would be,” NBCUniversal chief Steve Burke tells analysts. “Given the trends we stand to make money on future Olympics,” he adds.

“We’ll finish about 25% ahead of the [2008 Beijing] China Games with over $12 million,” said Peter Diaz, president-media operations, in Belo’s Wall Street conference call. And Belo President-CEO Dunia Shive told analysts that 3Q spot is strong after weakness in national brought 2Q ad sales, excluding political, in slightly below a year ago.

Andre Fernandez, president-CFO, said he is looking for M&A opportunities, with a bias toward television, particularly mid-size markets, while not ruling out additional radio acquisitions to fill out existing clusters.

In light of Media General’s new focus as a TV company, CEO Marshall Morton says it’s more likely his company will look for more JSA/SSA deals. Those, he says, are “a good way to extend our reach in the marketplace, particularly with respect to news and sales power, without added capital. I also see us pushing hard on the digital front, where it doesn’t take bricks and mortar to gain new market share.”

Dave Lougee, president, Gannett Broadcasting, in this mornings earnings call to analysts: “We will have a very strong third quarter. We already have significantly more dollars on the books for the London Olympics than we finished with for the Beijing Olympics in 2008 — and we still have inventory left to sell.”