Total revenues were $11.676 billion and EPS was $0.24 on a normalized basis, and free cash flow was $3.971 billion for the quarter. Time Warner listed its net debt at $35.3 billion, and it spent roughly $2.2 billion of its $5 billion for share buybacks since August 2007. The company also reaffirmed EPS targets at $1.07 with OIBDA growth in mid to high-teens from a base of $11 billion.
Oddly enough, AOL showed $635 million in subscription revenues. That is down 56% from Q3 2006, but that is still a huge number considering the access business has been sold off. So some people are still insisting on keeping their dial-up accounts even though they can get most services free besides the web access. Advertising revenues were up 13% to $540 million. Domestic ad revenues on an ex-TAC (traffic acquisition costs) basis were $330 million; unique monthly visitors were 113 million with an average ex-TAC revenue per user of $2.92.
Chairman Dick Parsons began the call, Wayne Pace is making comments after, then Jeff Bewkes will take over.
DICK PARSONS:
- "Expect double digit EPS growth into next year."
- "will add growth to AOL as well."
- "Results position for growth for next year and wants to see double-digit growth into the long-term plan."
- "Time Warner Cable is on track with its goals and will aggressively roll-out the phone bundle next year."
- "Film is expected to be for the full year."
- "Networks grew from HBO and Turner.
- "Publishing was a 12% OIBDA growth, declines in print were offset and trend will continue in fourth quarter."
- "AOL advertising growth may be disappointing to some of you, but the company is pleased and AOL will create the leading target platform. We announced the acquisition of Quigo for contextual targeting and will offer the most advanced and diverse platform to advertisers. While we pursue these efforts, we will have less visibility....."
This will be Wayne Pace's last earnings call. Wayne Pace, CFO: discussing slides on conference call, and I already summarized some of the data above.
Interestingly enough, the guidance does include the effect of share buybacks.
TWX shares now up 1.1% at $18.54 on 5.8 million shares (10:54 AM EST).
Wayne Pace: "Looking ahead to Q4 we expect page views to still grow, but outside of new Media Metrics calculations this would be expected to be flat."
The Q&A will be on a new LIVE BLOGGING POST.
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