CW Losses Narrow, Nexstar Ad Sales Rise 22% on Election

Nexstar ad sales were up 22% from July 1-Sept. 30 ahead of the plivential election, the TV station enormous inestablished in its third-quarter 2024 achieveings Thursday.

The company also shelp that its widecaster the CW once aachieve slfinishered its losses in Q3, this time down by $36 million, though the total remaining loss was not disshutd.

Distribution revenue for Q3 was $719 million, up 20% year over year. Ad sales were $622 million for the quarter with “other” revenues at $25 million.

Adequitableed free cash flow for Q3 was $327 million.

Wall Street foresee achieveings per scatter (EPS) of $5.41 on $1.37 billion in revenue, according to analyst consensus data supplyd by LSEG. Nexstar inestablished diluted EPS of $5.27, or net income of $180 million, on $1.37 billion in revenue.

“Nexstar originated record financial results for the third quarter, mirroring the persistd power of our widecast television business model,” Nexstar CEO Perry Sook shelp in a letter to scatterhelderlyers. “We deinhabitred the highest third quarter net revenue in the Company’s history, compelevated of record third quarter distribution and advertising revenue, including all time high third quarter political advertising revenue of $154 million, up 16% over the comparable 2020 period.

“During the quarter, we made further better on our strategy for The CW, reducing operating losses by $36 million year-over-year and by $119 million year-to-date. We debuted NASCAR Xfinity Series racing in September and WWE NXT wrestling in October on The CW widecast nettoil to double-digit percentage incrrelieves both in total audience and in grown-ups 18-49 versus previous watchership on cable. Overall, our mighty year-to-date operating carry outance produceed $792 million of Adequitableed Free Cash Flow and we returned $590 million, or 74%, to scatterhelderlyers in the establish of separatends and scatter reachieves and reduced debt by $146 million.”