Seven West Media posted a statutory loss of $444.48 million for the year to June as the media group writes down the value of its television licences in a soft advertising market.
The result compared to a profit of $133.67 million in 2018. This year, excluding significant items of $573.7 million, profit after tax was down almost 8% to $129.29 million.
Revenue for the 12 months to June fell 4.2% to $1.55 billion.
Seven West Media says its television licence and newspaper masthead carrying values were impaired due to a softer advertising market.
There is more pain ahead, Seven West Media expects the metro TV advertising market to decline in 2020 by low single digits.
James Warburton, the new CEO, says 2019 was a tough year in the economy and advertising markets.
"But we have incredibly strong assets, and our focus moving forward is to speed up the rate of transformation while exploring opportunities for growth in our core and adjacent markets," he says.
"We will revitalise our entertainment programming, creating momentum to engage heartland Australia and enrich the demographic mix, ensuring we are the most relevant and exciting offer to advertisers.
“We will sharpen our focus on being a high-performance audience and sales led organisation, and we will redefine our working practices, becoming more efficient and effective and making savings which do not impact on ratings.
“We will be a hunter and explore M&A opportunities in both traditional media and nontraditional adjacencies that are positive for our shareholders.”
The company is targeting underlying 2020 group EBIT to be between $190 million and $200 million.
The 2019 numbers in detail:
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