New York Times gains 5% as subscriptions drive stellar quarter
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The New York Times Co. (NYSE:NYT) is 4.5% higher today after its fourth-quarter earnings topped expectations on nearly every measure, and the company boosted its dividend and set a new stock buyback.
The company benefited from stronger-than-expected uptake of digital products, and it surpassed its goal of hitting 10 million subscribers by 2025 (thanks to its $550 million acquisition of The Athletic).
It's now set a new target of at least 15 million total subscribers by the end of 2027. And next quarter it will begin reporting unique suscribers along with individual sub growth.
Adjusted profit was well above expectations on revenues that jumped nearly 17%, to $594.2 million.
Net new digital subscriptions hit 375,000 in the quarter, 171,000 of them from News. Overall, the company ended the quarter with 7.6 million paid subscribers, with about 8.89 million paid subscriptions across its print and digital products. Of the 7.6 million subscribers, 6.8 million were paid digital subs with just over 8 million digital-only subscriptinos.
Revenue breakout: Subscriptions, $351.2 million (up 11.2%); Advertising, $176.8 million (up 26.9%); Other, $66.3 million (up 22.1%).
“Our performance in 2021 demonstrated the power of our digital-first, subscription-first approach as we posted our second-best year ever for net subscription additions and strongest operating profit and adjusted operating profit in many years, which was a result of our consistent strategy and focus," says CEO Meredith Kopit Levien.
She alluded to a big and growing addressable market: “Our latest audience research suggests there are now at least 135 million adults worldwide who are paying or willing to pay for one or more subscriptions to English-language news, sports coverage, puzzles, recipes, or expert shopping advice."
Liquidity was $1.07 billion as of Dec. 26, up $188 million year-over-year. (About $550 million was used after the end of the fiscal year to fund the purchase of The Athletic.)
Related to its non-news digital products, the company shored up its Games operation with its announced purchase of red-hot word game Wordle.
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Comments (5)
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Even if the acquisition is for cash, investors might view it negatively as an attempt to distract from earnings.
They should really just do this more slowly, like boiling a frog, and they would probably get more money out of people like me who are too lazy to call over $1-$2/month increase, but will do so over $10+/month increases.
They have been losing more subscribers than they gained over the years. Half this country does not care for their ideology and don't want to pay to read it. I don't think this is about the cost, The new Wordle game may entice new readers but for how long? Some unbiased and factual articles would help but they stay in line with DC. Just saying......
I don't have any interest in answering your question on a personal level. On a sober, detached level, there is already enough commentary on the quality of reporting in the Times across the world of journalism that I don't need to add more.