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The McClatchy Co. Earnings Cheat Sheet: Beats the Street Despite Profit Decline

October 24 2011 Tweet Email This

Although The McClatchy Company’s (NYSE:MNI) net income fell in the third quarter from a year earlier, profit exceeded analysts’ expectations. McClatchy is a newspaper company in the United States.

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The McClatchy Company Earnings Cheat Sheet for the Third Quarter

Results: Net income for The McClatchy Company fell to $9.4 million (11 cents per share) vs. $11.9 million (14 cents per share) a year earlier. This is a decline of 21.1% from the year earlier quarter.

Revenue: Fell 8.4% to $300.2 million from the year earlier quarter.

Actual vs. Wall St. Expectations: MNI beat the mean analyst estimate of 4 cents per share. It fell short of the average revenue estimate of $307.8 million.

Quoting Management: Gary Pruitt, chairman and chief executive officer, said, “Advertising revenues were down 10.0% in the third quarter of 2011, in line with the trend so far this year. We saw some improvement in revenue trends late in the quarter: advertising revenue was down 10.4% in July, 10.8% in August and 8.7% in September.”

Key Stats:

The company has now topped analyst estimates for the last four quarters. It beat the mark by 8 cents in the second quarter, by 6 cents in the first quarter, and by 5 cents in the fourth quarter of the last fiscal year.

Revenue has fallen in the past four quarters. Revenue declined 8.1% to $314.3 million in the second quarter. The figure fell 9.5% in the first quarter from the year earlier and dropped 5.9% in the fourth quarter of the last fiscal year from the year-ago quarter.

Looking Forward: Expectations for the fourth quarter have not changed from 33 cents. The average estimate for the fiscal year has remained at 35 cents per share.

Competitors to Watch: Gannett Co., Inc. (NYSE:GCI), GateHouse Media, Inc. (GHSE), The New York Times Company (NYSE:NYT), Lee Enterprises, Inc. (NYSE:LEE), A.H. Belo Corporation (NYSE:AHC), Media General, Inc. (NYSE:MEG), Sun Times Media Group, Inc. (SUTMQ), The E.W. Scripps Company (NYSE:SSP), Daily Journal Corporation (NASDAQ:DJCO), AOL (NYSE:AOL), Interactive Corp (NASDAQ:IACI), McGraw-Hill (NYSE:MHP), Pearson (NYSE:PSO), Washington Post (NYSE:WPO) and News Corporation (NASDAQ:NWSA).