“It’s a heavy lift.”
That summarizes the challenges for Cumulus Media CEO Mary Berner to turn around the company. She reminded everyone as the company announced its Q1 earnings Cumulus is in the early stages of a multi-year fix.
“The challenges before us are substantial,” said Berner.
At the same time, Cumulus is exploring all options to reduce its debt. It needs to address its capital structure by the end of 2017 or its options will be limited. The company needs more “runway” to accomplish its goals.
The radio station group had slight revenue growth with improvement in the quarter and $3.2 million of political ad spend in the primaries.
However Westwood one revenue declined $3 million due to softening demand.
Overall Cumulus net revenue was $268.5 million, down 0.9% compared to the same quarter a year ago and adjusted EBITDA was $41.9 million, down 6.1% from Q1 2015.
Nasdaq earlier notified Cumulus it had to get its stock price above $1; the company has not been able to do so for 30 consecutive days. It now has approval to transfer the listing of its Class A common stock from the Nasdaq Global Select Market to the Nasdaq Capital Market, giving Cumulus a 180-day grace period.
