News Corporation Reports Second Quarter Operating Income of $920 Million as Revenues Increase to $6.7 Billion; Income from Continuing Operations Increases to $694 Million - Feb 8, 2006 04:05 PM (BusinessWire)
NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 8, 2006--News Corporation
QUARTER HIGHLIGHTS
-- Cable Network Programming operating income up 15% on advertising growth at Fox News Channel and higher affiliate revenues at the Regional Sports Networks.
-- Television operating income up 20% on strong revenue growth at STAR and lower promotional costs at the FOX Network due to the earlier launch of its fall lineup versus a year ago.
-- Filmed Entertainment delivers operating income of $299 million on continued strength of home entertainment sales of film and television titles. $108 million decrease versus prior year reflects record home entertainment results in second quarter a year ago.
-- New subscriber additions at SKY Italia improve operating results by $52 million. At quarter end the subscriber base had expanded to 3.6 million, an increase of 496,000 subscribers in the past 12 months.
-- Newspaper operating income declines as $99 million in redundancy costs associated with the printing project and advertising weakness in the U.K. more than offsets the inclusion of Queensland Press' results in Australia.
-- Increased contributions from the In-Store division drives Magazines and Inserts operating income up 4% while an array of bestsellers at HarperCollins raises Book Publishing operating income 24%.
News Corporation today reported second quarter income from continuing operations of $694 million, ($0.21 per share on a diluted combined basis(1)), as compared with $386 million ($0.13 per share on a diluted combined basis(1)) reported in the second quarter a year ago. These results primarily reflect an increase in equity earnings of affiliates and increased Other income from the unrealized change in fair value of certain outstanding exchangeable debt securities partially offset by a decrease in consolidated operating income.
(1) See supplemental financial data on page 14 for detail on earnings per share
Consolidated operating income for the second quarter of $920 million was down 4% versus the $954 million reported a year ago, primarily as a result of a $99 million redundancy provision recorded this quarter in connection with the U.K. newspaper printing project, as well as a reduction from the record Filmed Entertainment operating income reported in the second quarter a year ago. These items more than offset double-digit improvements from the Television, Cable Network Programming, Direct Broadcast Satellite and Book Publishing segments.
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