MADRID and NEW YORK, October 24, 2011 /PRNewswire/ --

Prisa Has Achieved In The First 3 Quarters Of 2011 Revenues Of 2,038.52 Million Euros And An Ebitda Of 379.69 Million

These figures adjusted for nonrecurring items reflect a 1.9% growth in EBITDA

All businesses in Q3 show a strong operating performance

• Pay TV continued to improve all its key performance indicators, and obtained an EBITDA of 148.19 million Euros, reflecting an increase, adjusted for nonrecurring items, of 6.9%.

• Santillana increased its total revenues by 10.3%, reflecting the strong performance of the Education Campaigns in all the countries where it is present.

• Advertising revenues reached 443.69 million Euros, reflecting an improvement in Q3 vs the first half of the year.

• In Latin America, revenues grew by 14.1% and already account for 22% of the Group-wide total.

• The Group´s Digital activity increased operating revenues by 6.8% and the average number of unique users of the Group's sites has increased by 28.6% year on year.

• The efficiency plan announced continues its course in all business lines as planned.

• Prisa's shareholders, TIMON S.A., Nicolas Berggruen and Martin Franklin, have stated their intention to exercise 75 million warrants, for a total amount of 150 million Euros.

• The company is presenting a refinancing proposal to the banks which includes, as key element, the partial exercise of warrants.

Grupo PRISA (hereafter "PRISA" or the "Company") (NYSE: PRIS), the world's leading group in Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking markets in the fields of education, information and entertainment, today announced its financial and operational results for the first nine months of 2011. In the period, the Group achieved revenues of 2,038.52 million Euros and an EBITDA of 379.69 million euros (+1.9% growth ex non recurrent items).

The Chairman of the Executive committee of the Board and CEO Juan Luis Cebrián declared: "In an adverse macro environment, the results of the first nine months of 2011 continue to reflect the strong operating performance of our businesses. The growth in our Education activities, both in Spain and in Latin America, together with the improved operating indicators of pay-TV, and a strong cost cutting effort, have partly mitigated the bad performance of the advertising market, which are undergoing a very difficult time"

"Following the announcement of the agreement with the core shareholder to exercise 75,000,000 warrants, which will imply the entry of 150,000,000 Euros in cash, our priority today is to close the refinancing process with the banks, which we expect will succeed in the short term".

9M 2011 highlights

• Market conditions remain stable in all business areas except advertising and general publishing (Ediciones Generales), which are still being affected by negative macroeconomic conditions, especially in Spain and Portugal.

• In the Audiovisual division, revenue totaled 930.39 million Euros, and adjusted EBITDA totaled 189.34 million euros. Adjusted EBITDA margins increased by almost 3 percentage points to 20.6%. At the end of Q3, pay TV had 1.83 million subscribers, of which 57,486 correspond to wholesale distribution and DTT. Net adds of DTH subscribers performed well reaching 7,040 in Q3, compared with -20.788 in Q3 2010. Churn rate continued to decrease to 13.5%. Subscribers to iPlus and Multi+ services rose almost by 50% YTD.

• Revenue in the Education division was 548.84 million Euros, up 15.5% in LatAm thanks to strong campaign performance (particularly in Brazil where revenues grew 21.1%) and the strong Education campaign in Spain, where revenues grew 11.6%. Adjusted EBITDA reached 167.12 million euros, a 4.0% improvement over the first 9 months in 2010, with a slight reduction in margins (from 32.3% to 30.4%).

• Revenue in the Radio division stood at 269.48 million Euros, down 6.3% year on year, with Radio in Spain down 5.9% and International radio up 8.8%. Adjusted EBITDA totaled 60.01 million euros (-11.7%) and the adjusted EBITDA margin was 22.3%.

• Revenue in Press was 293.06 million Euros, down by 4.7% from last year. Adjusted EBITDA totaled 36.80 million Euros, a 17.3% improvement over the same period last year, with an improvement of 2.4 pps in margin to 12.6%.

• The Digital division achieved a monthly average of 63.3 million unique users in the first half, a 28.6% increase compared to the same period last year, thanks to strong growth recorded by As.com, El Pais.com and Cinco Días.com.

• Advertising revenue totaled 443.69 million Euros, down 7.2% from the same period the previous year (-7.8% in H1).

Consolidated earnings

The comparison of Q3 earnings is affected by the fact that Cuatro ceased to be part of the consolidation in 2011 and by extraordinary items recorded under revenue and expenses in the same period both in 2011 and 2010. Therefore, to conduct a homogeneous comparison, we are presenting a pro forma profit and loss account showing the 2010 earnings of Cuatro as a discontinuing operation and we adjust the extraordinary items:

                                                    JANUARY - SEPTEMBER
                                                         PROFORMA
 
                              EUR Million        2011      2010      Chg.%
 
    Operating Revenues                         2,038.52  2,088.05    (2.4)
    EBITDA                                       379.69    474.2    (19.9)
    EBIT                                         210.66    307.49   (31.5)
    Net financial result                        (133.65)  (112.43)  (18.9)
                             Interest on debt    (91.43)   (90.60)   (0.9)
                             Other financial
                             results             (42.23)   (21.83   (93.5)
    Result from associates*                        4.37     (5.05)  186.5
    Profit before tax                             81.38    190.01   (57.2)
    Income tax expense                           (13.93)   (58.27)   76.1
    Results from discontinued                     (1.03)   (16.09)   93.6
    activities
    Minority interest                            (48.49)   (24.14) (100.9)
    Net profit                                    17.93     91.53   (80.4)
 
    EBITDA Margin                                 18.6%     22.7%
    EBIT Margin                                   10.3%     14.7%
 
    One-offs in operating revenues**              12.29     41.26
    Mediapro sentence                             -         33.00
    Others                                        12.29      8.26
 
    One-offs in operating expenses***             55.59    (17.83)
    Redundancies                                  55.59      6.00
    Renegotiation with suppliers                  -        (23.83)
 
    Adjusted Operating Revenues                2,026.23  2,046.80    (1.0)
 
    Adjusted EBITDA                              423.00    415.17     1.9
    Adjusted EBITDA Margin                        20.9%     20.3%
 
    Adjusted EBIT                                253.97    248.40     2.2
    Adjusted EBIT Margin                          12.5%     12.1%

    TABLE CONTINUED BELOW
                                                      JULY- SEPTEMBER
                                                         PROFORMA
 
                              EUR Million        2011      2010      Chg.%
 
    Operating Revenues                           687.75    679.09     1.3
    EBITDA                                       159.49    170.59    (6.5)
    EBIT                                          93.43     99.65    (6.2)
    Net financial result                         (53.82)   (26.42) (103.7)
                              Interest on debt   (33.33)   (31.20)   (6.8)
                              Other financial
                              results            (20.49)     4.78    -
    Result from associates*                       (0.68)    (1.62)   57.8
    Profit before tax                             38.93     71.61   (45.6)
    Income tax expense                           (13.46)   (25.56)   47.4
    Results from discontinued                      1.10     (8.32)  113.2
    activities
    Minority interest                            (19.74)    (7.08) (178.8)
    Net profit                                     6.83     30.65   (77.7)
 
    EBITDA Margin                                 23.2%     25.1%
    EBIT Margin                                   13.6%     14.7%
 
    One-offs in operating revenues**              12.29     -
    Mediapro sentence                             -         -
    Others                                        12.29     -
 
    One-offs in operating expenses***             25.35      2.79
    Redundancies                                  25.35      3.01
    Renegotiation with suppliers                             -       (0.22)
 
    Adjusted Operating Revenues                  675.47    679.09    (0.5)
 
    Adjusted EBITDA                              172.55    173.38    (0.5)
    Adjusted EBITDA Margin                                  25.5%    25.5%
 
    Adjusted EBIT                                106.49    102.44     4.0
    Adjusted EBIT Margin                          15.8%     15.1%

**  Extraordinary items for revenue are recorded in the audiovisual area and correspond in 2011 to the sale of Canal Viajar

*** Extraordinary items for expenditures are recorded in all business units

SOURCE Grupo Prisa