Surely 2011 is not a good year for the two largest telecoms in Spain, Antena 3 and Telecinco. If during the first quarter, market consensus had already cut earnings predictions for both companies, given the inclimate state of the advertising markets, since May this trend has intensified even more, resulting in net profit losses greater than 15% for both companies.
Without a doubt, Telecinco (Mediaset España) has been hit the hardest. In their case, the market consensus (according to FactSet) has shaved net profit predictions by 25% since the beginning of May, from 246 to 185 billion euros. The gross results (ebitda), on the other hand, has dropped 27% in the last three months, from 302 to 220 million euros.
In this context, mid-year results that the chain Feuncarral published last week have also been unable to revert the trend, the duration of which will depend on how the next advertising season begins in September. Paolo Vasile's company announced last week that its profits were 540 million euros through June, a 14.4% drop from last year. According to sources at the company, the drop happened because there were no earnings from the World Cup that took place in South African in 2010.
