Q3 revenues were up 4.4% to $51.4 million at Salem Communications. But radio revenues only gained 2.7% to $43.5 million, while non-broadcast revenues gained 15% to $7.9 million.
For Q4 Salem is expecting revenues to be up 3-4% for the overall company.
EBITDA in Q3 improved to $11.9 million from a loss of $200K a year ago. Station operating income (SOI) for the radio operations increased 2.6% to $15.6 million.
Same station broadcast revenue was up 2.3% and SOI gained 2%.
CEO Ed Atsinger provided a little color on the results in his Wall Street conference call. “The local is still very dormant,” he said, noting that Salem’s Christian teaching stations do a lot of local direct business. The company’s block programming business, which had been soft earlier in the year, has been improving. It was up 4% in Q3.
Salem also doesn’t get as much political spending as general market broadcasters. Q3 political was only $1.1 million. Atsinger noted that October is the biggest month for political, which will be reported in Q4 results.
