Tribune Media Broadcasting Sales Zoom, Advertising Falls

Tribune Media delivered its first quarterly result after it was split off from Tribune Publishing, and it looks like a solid quarter. Profit came in at 83 cents a share, that's a lot better than estimates. Sales rose 23% to nearly $900 million, all thanks to the strong growth in the broadcasting segment. Tribune acquired Local TV last December and broadcasting revenue for the quarter jumped 63% to $425 million. Re-transmission revenue also surged 78%. Advertising revenue declined slightly, but CEO Peter Ligouri believes the rest of the growth is enough to balance it out. He said, 'While the core advertising market experienced headwinds in the first half of the year, we continue to be encouraged by the strength of our new broadcast scale, as evidenced in our year-over-year retransmission fee increases.' Tribune Media also wants to take advantage of the political advertising for the upcoming midterm election.