Same old, same old at ACME

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Television group ACME has a different profile than most of the groups that trade publicly – it has only six stations in five markets, and a CW affiliate in each of those markets. Despite this, its results for Q2 2009 were right in line with most other TV groups, particularly the drop in net revenue, which came in at -21% to $6.9M. 23% of the loss came from station operations. Non-political advertising was down -20%; local was off 17%; national was off 36%.


Like most companies, it is also cutting expenses wherever possible.

On the plus side, its nationally-syndicated morning show “The Daily Buzz” enjoyed a 6% gain in revenue.
The company is expecting Q3 to look much like Q2. The company is looking for ways to permanently lower the cost structure of the company.

ACME said it is open to any opportunity to work in-market with another owner, offering its own management expertise for some form of LMA operation; with that in mind, it’s closely watching situations such as the Equity Media sell-off for the development of such situations. However, it sees little or no possibility of merger/acquisition opportunity in the present environment.

Jamie Kellner, ACME’s Chairman and CEO, said, “We continue operating in a very challenging marketplace and we are doing everything prudently possible to reduce costs to help minimize the adverse impact that this difficult economic environment is having on our financial performance. We have entered into agreements with certain of our key program suppliers to restructure our program payments which we believe, together with our current revolving credit facility, will give us financial flexibility to weather this economic storm.”