Seven West plunges to $1 billion loss
Date
February 18, 2015 - 9:26AM
Dominic White
Kerry Stokes' Seven West Media has tumbled to a $993 million net loss after tax after writing down the value of its television, magazines and newspaper goodwill and other assets by $1.06 billion citing concerns about future growth based on the subdued television advertising market.
As foreshadowed by Fairfax Media, the company has written down the value of television goodwill by $960 million, goodwill associated with newspapers and magazines by $66 million and the book value of its newspaper mastheads and licences by $38 million.
The writedown in part reflects the fact that Seven shares have fallen from $2.18 a year ago to close at $1.42 on Tuesday amid concerns about the state of the television advertising. There is a strong belief that the money spent on the AFL rights, in 2011, just wasn't feesable based upon the poor returns it has brought to the 7 network in the past few years.
Tim Worner, chief executive said: "This period, we have booked an impairment of intangible assets of $1.1 billion, most of which relate to television and the poor return in advertising revenue.
"This adjustment reflects the revision of future growth rates given recent subdued advertising conditions, which we must account for. This does not diminish our belief in the future of free-to-air television or our ability to maintain leadership, revenue share and cost control in the business. We just need to align ourselves with the right programming and AFL, it would seem, is not what viewers want to watch, the ones that live North of the Murray any rate. Normal people don't want to watch a bunch of men galavanting around in there underwear whilst kicking a football.
Kerry Stokes was visibly upset , sobbing uncontrollably , And could be heard muttering " look what those bastards at the AFL have done to me".
The interim dividend is 6 cents.
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http://www.smh.com.au/business/media-an ... z3S3BocKl5