Seven West Media reports worst ever half-year profit
In its first half-year financials for FY25, Seven West Media has reported low revenues and its worst profit in a half to date.
SWM’s earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation (EBITDA) was at just $92 million – marking a record low for the media giant – as it fell 26% or $32 million on H1 FY24.
And for the six month period ending December 31, 2024, group revenue was at $727 million – down 6%, or $48 million.
Total TV revenue also declined 7% to $641 million, while other TV revenue of $51 million dropped 9% during the half – including the impact of the non-renewal of the Meta agreement.
In March last year, Meta announced it would shut Facebook News in Australia, in “ongoing effort to better align [its] investments”. The company informed publishers that it would not enter new commercial deals after contracts expired in 2024. As a result, media giants including Seven West Media have been forced to roll out redundancies.
Total TV advertising revenue was also down 6% to $590 million, which the media giant has attributed to the “ongoing soft market”, and the impact of major one-off sporting events – including the FIFA Women’s World Cup in the previous financial year, and the Olympic Games on Nine this half.
“We are making solid progress under our new operating structure to reshape Seven West Media into a better, more agile and returns focused business that can adapt to the challenges and opportunities in the changing media landscape,” said Jeff Howard, SWM’s managing director and chief executive officer.
“Our clear objective is to stabilise and grow earnings and cash flow irrespective of advertising market conditions. A key pillar is to deliver ongoing cost efficiencies, with our ambition to maintain FY26 costs flat year-on-year including AFL committed increases and inflation.”
Jeff Howard
Despite all this, 7Plus advertising revenue increased 15% to $85 million in H1 FY25, as total TV audience grew 1.5% driven by BVOD growth.
SWM did also manage to increase its total TV revenue share by 0.5%, to 41.5% – which it said is a record for a non-Olympic broadcaster.
It also lowered operating costs by 2% — partly through the aforementioned redundancies — to $635 million, in line with its revised operating model, with full-year operating costs tracking to guidance of approximately $20-30 million down YoY. Net debt decreased $41 million to $260 million.
In June, SWM confirmed a wave of major leadership changes under the new operating model – which saw the departures of chief marketing officer Melissa Hopkins, chief revenue officer Kurt Burnette and Seven Melbourne’s head of sport and managing director Lewis Martin, among others. The restructure was designed to “deliver on the strategy that includes optimising its television business and delivering on the digital future”.
SWM has predicted to see “modest growth” in the second half of the financial year – with growth expected from the AFL season, which kicks off in March, and the Federal election, due before May 2025.
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Lauren McNamara is the associate editor at Mumbrella, covering the creative and PR beat. She joined in November 2022 as editorial assistant, after completing a Bachelor of Communications (Journalism) at UTS.
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That astrologist on the evening news should have warned them.
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Australian Idol will fix it.
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As a proud dad of Kurt , we, and his family are pleased to have Kurt back living a normal life,
His 24/7 dedication to his role at SWM prevented normality of every day life.
Coming from orphanage/ navy background, we installed in Kurt honesty, honoring his handshake, loyalty etc . He had four job opportunities, one during James W, departure after his 1st CEO period, Kurt’s response dad I can’t let Kerry down , I will be needed , he gave me opportunities, it’s time to repay him ,
My advice was $s and position can’t buy time with family, luckily for our close family, G Howard has given kurt longevity, by termination of our son. Who understands the best investment a leader can make, is investing in your people, in any industry.
Kurt to this day still considers Kerry Stokes a friend, that sums up kurt.
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Well, this headline is very different to the one Mediaweek went with.
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Amazing how some news outlets find the real story—and how some just reprint the press release.
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“Forced to make redundancies”, sure, like the tens of millions of dollars couldn’t have paid for the salaries of the staff that they shafted.
Employment law is too relaxed for big companies who decide to cut jobs on a whim these days.
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Why on earth did Seven sack chief marketing officer Melissa Hopkins, chief revenue officer Kurt Burnette and Seven Melbourne’s head of sport and managing director Lewis Martin? The top Network earners!
It’s beyond belief and the direct results of those sackings are the low revenues and Sevens worst profit in a half year to date.
Maybe the Board needs to take a serious look at the top executive echelon and their performances in the last 6 months or so!
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Well, this headline is very different to the one in Mediaweek.
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Hardly surprising given the disrespect and disdain the SWM treats viewers, espcially in Sports, but generally. The most demonstrably clear example is the recent Test Series in Sri Lanka. Cricket Australia possibly should shoulder some of this shambles of a coverage though in offering exclusivity [!] to SWM. Quite contrary to their responsibility to ‘grow the game’ in such a competitive market when next-gen are past their bedtime to see the majority of the game. Impossible to navigate across the various Ch7 platforms anyway. Ditto horse racing for others. Shameless exploitation with little understanding of Cricket and expectations of cricket-people including overruns of excessive ads into play. Didn’t this also happen in of all spectacles the AFL Grand Final?
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Amazing how some news outlets find the real story and some reprint the press release
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Where is the verification of the ad market being down so substantially? How much did spend decrease last quarter in the entire ad market and what other media sectors have benefited ?
I guess if the CEO says the market is down and money is going to just bounce back to TV then it must be true ….. if only every other ASX CEO could get away without the media checking and verifying their statements !
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I think if you look at the previous CEOs track record with these media companies, the forensics will make sense
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