NZME announced today its financial results for 2019. Total operating revenue for 2019 was down four percent as print remains unsteady.
NZME reported Total Operating Revenue of $371.7 million (down 4 percent on 2018) and Operating EBITDA of $50.6 million (down 7 percent on 2018) for the twelve months ended 31 December 2019.
Statutory Net Profit After Tax (NPAT) showed a net loss of $165.2 million for the year to 31 December 2019.
Herald paywall brought in $1.7m but there seems to have been some loss too, part of the overall $2.1m drop in digital ad revenue is attributed to lower page views and audience during the paywall implementation.
NZME results stated radio has overtaken print in total advertising revenue brought in, $111m to $102m as against print’s $114m to $108m lead a year ago.
Print revenue for 2019 continues to reflect the challenging nature of the print market in New Zealand. While readership of the NZ Herald remains at record levels. the NZ Herald has average issue readership of 465,000 and 1.7 million weekly brand audience, print advertising revenue declined 10 percent compared with 2018 to $102.2 million.
The two areas of growth Radio and OneRoof were both part of NZME’s, “strategic priorities” says CEO Michael Boggs.
“It’s been very pleasing to see radio revenue growth of 5 percent in the second half of the year contributing to full-year revenue growth of 2 percent. We will continue to focus on radio growth and recently announced significant host changes to some of our radio brands to capitalise on the audience growth delivered in 2019.
OneRoof now has over 75 percent of residential for sale listings in New Zealand and 95 percent of residential for sale listings in Auckland2. OneRoof revenue grew to $2.8 million in 2019.
Boggs says they will continue to look for commercial opportunities, which includes a big focus on the possible purchase of Stuff.
“NZME firmly believes it is the right owner for Stuff. We expect that as well as supporting NZME’s strategic priorities, the potential acquisition of Stuff would create a stronger and more sustainable media presence, enhance our audience and advertising proposition, deliver cost savings and synergy benefits and deliver increased financial scale.”
