Q2 revenues for Young Broadcasting were down 8.5% to 52 million, mainly due to the lack of political advertising but CEO Vincent Young noted that revenues from the company's "3rd Leg" effort to bring in new advertisers were up 10% and Internet revenues shot up 74%. So, he's looking forward to a big year in 2008 as political advertising heats up. "We will outperform our peer group," Young declared.
The biggest drag for Young Broadcasting is its biggest market, San Francisco. Young said the market was down 15% and KRON-TV (Ch. 4), now a MyNetworkTV affiliate, did even worse. But, with no programming fees for the MyNetworkTV fare in primetime, costs are lower on the former independent and Young says the station is more profitable.
In Q&A one investor asked about efforts to sell KRON. Young noted that the recent downturn in the credit markets has made it difficult to do a deal now, but he remains committed to delivering a good return to shareholders. "It's just not easy to line up the right buyer," he said.
CFO Jim Morgan noted that costs were down for the 3rd quarter in a row. Station operating performance for Q2 was 13 million. If you back out the political ad drop and termination costs, he said the operating performance was flat with a year ago.
