Posted on 02/04/2009 4:54:08 AM PST by abb
Time Warner Inc. on Wednesday reported a $16 billion loss in the fourth quarter after writing down the value of intangible assets held by the company's cable operations, AOL and Time Inc.
Time Warner (TWX) lost $16 billion, or $4.47 a share, compared with a profit of $1.03 billion, or 28 a share in the year-earlier quarter.
Excluding the charges, Time Warner would have earned 23 cents a share in the latest three months.
Revenue fell 3% to $12.3 billion.
The company was expected to earn 27 cents a share on revenue of $12.7 billion, according to a poll of analysts taken by Thomson First Call.
Earnings for 2009 are seen "about flat" compared to 2008 results.
"We're making progress at Time Warner toward our goals of becoming a more content-focused company and delivering increasing returns to our stockholders. Last year, our priorities were to rationalize our structure and improve our operating performance," said Chairman and CEO Jeff Bewkes.
The results echo a dismal earnings report issued Tuesday by Walt Disney Co. (DIS) , which posted a 32% decline in profit on decreased DVD and advertising sales, and added more fuel to Wall Street's concerns that no relief is in sight for media companies in 2009. See full story. At AOL, revenue dropped to $968 million from $1.25 billion.
Advertising revenue fell 18%, continuing a long slide. Ad revenue at AOL grew 46% in the third quarter of 2006. By last year's third quarter, it had narrowed to 13% growth, followed by 10% in the fourth quarter of 2007, 1% in the first three months of 2008, 2% in the second quarter and 6% in the third quarter.
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(Excerpt) Read more at marketwatch.com ...
ping
http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/02/03/wapo-no-more-freelance-pay-for-staffers/
WaPo: No More “Freelance” Pay for Staffers
http://www.observer.com/2009/media/beast-roared-while
The Beast That Roared (for a While!)
http://cancelthebee.blogspot.com/
Modesto Bee shrinking... management proposal calls for cutting weekly page count by as many as 16 pages
http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/090204/na_us_earns_time_warner.html?.v=1
Time Warner swings to 4Q loss on hefty writedown
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123370933597245913.html
Video Sites Entice Users To Stay and Play
Folks can look for a 35% increase in their monthly premiums for basic cable next quarter....it’s the American way, ya know.
Time magazine is a propaganda tool for the DNC. I don’t think they care if they make a profit on it or not. They have the presidency and the congress and soon the courts. They will live on with the pork (”stimulus”) that comes their way.
I wonder if they will be breaking back apart or just consolidating the advertising and media content provider (AOL and Cable Channels). I wouldn’t proclaim their death, yet. I think this was a one time big write down to go a head with a “fresh start”. Their service provider (Cable/Internet/Phone) end probably still makes good money.
The cable/internet component (TWC) is being spun off from the rest of the company (TWX). The old company will eventually fade away with the rest of the dinosaurs.
Bruce Springsteen did get it right at least in one song ("57 Channels and Nothing On"). In fact, these days, there are about 400 channels and pretty much nothing on. If I have to find something worth my time on the cable, I usually end up watching "Cops" re-runs or something on the National Geographic or History channel. The rest of it is pretty much pure garbage.
So I'm hoping that the price of cable TV continues to rise so that I can eventually convince my wife to dump this service and then I'll rig up a video box that will capture off the internet for free the small amount of content that is actually worth watching. About the only thing I will really miss if I cancel cable TV is live NFL football. But getting my Sunday afternoons back, I can get used to that. I'll take more Sunday afternoon hikes and get some more book reading done.
http://www.adweek.com/aw/content_display/news/media/e3i9f631ea10a4997bce3019d8872f32908
Disney Profit Dives
Iger: ‘Very significant’ cost cutting on the way
http://www.magazinedeathpool.com/
Arizona Woman: RIP February 2009
http://recoveringjournalist.typepad.com/recovering_journalist/
Sheer Idiocy
New word! “Printies”
http://recoveringjournalist.typepad.com/recovering_journalist/2008/08/beware-the-printies.html
Beware the Printies
I don’t understand the Disney dive considering every man woman and child in America seems to have multiple copies of High School Musical and Camp Rock.
On the other hand they have mined their back catalogue for decades now with ‘limited’ releases of their classics. It may be possible that everybody who wants a copy of Cinderella finally has one.
We have a local oldies sub channel that shows A-Team, Knight Rider, Air Wolf, Mangnum, Rockford Files, weekly in the evenings. Also, Emergency, Adam-12, and lots of westerns on the weekend afternoons......so, I'm happy....can get local 24hr weather on 3 subs all the time. PBS has good stuff too for DIY, Nature, etc. I love the older programs.....better scripts.
http://www.niemanlab.org/
NewspaperProject: a wobbly kickoff
http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?fa=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=99628
Prime-Time TV Commercial Prices Plummet, CBS Faces Biggest Drop
Disney is also ABC Television. Broadcast ad revenues sucketh. See link above from Media Post.
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