News Corp posts rise in first-quarter revenue

News Corporation beat estimates for first-quarter revenue on Thursday, driven by growth in its digital real estate services, book publishing and Dow Jones segments.
The media and information services group, which owns publications including The Times, The Sunday Times and The Wall Street Journal, reported revenues of $2.58 billion in the three months to the end of September, compared with $2.57 billion estimated by analysts and up 3 per cent from $2.5 billion in the previous year’s first quarter.
The company, which also said Susan Panuccio will depart from her role as finance chief and will be replaced by Lavanya Chandrashekar early next year, reported quarterly net income of $144 million against $58 million in the same period in 2023.
News Corp’s Dow Jones division, which provides news and business information and includes The Wall Street Journal, Barron’s, MarketWatch and Investor’s Business Daily, saw a surge in content licensing and digital subscription. The arm, which accounts for the largest share of revenue, grew 3 per cent to $552 million in the first quarter.
The company’s digital real estate services arm, which includes REA Group, the Melbourne-headquartered online real estate advertising company, saw a 13 per cent rise in quarterly revenue to $457 million, as residential demand remains strong in Australia due to price increases. In September the company walked away from a £6.2 billion bid for its London-listed rival Rightmove after a fourth offer was rejected.
Revenue from the book publishing unit HarperCollins rose 4 per cent to $546 million on higher sales of its physical and digital books. Key titles included Hillbilly Elegy by JD Vance, now the US vice-president-elect, A Death in Cornwall by Daniel Silva and The Au Pair Affair by Tessa Bailey.
News Corp’s news media division reported that digital represented 39 per cent of its quarterly revenues, compared with 37 per cent a year ago. Digital subscriber numbers for The Times, The Sunday Times and the Times Literary Supplement at the end of September were 600,000, compared with 572,000 previously.
The Sun’s digital offering reached 80 million global monthly unique users in September compared with 134 million a year ago.
Robert Thomson, chief executive of News Corp, said the fact that record quarterly revenue and profit numbers had been achieved in “macro-conditions which are far from auspicious” was “compelling evidence of the successful transformation of News Corp over the past decade”.
Referring to the race for the White House, he said the election “has highlighted the importance of trusted journalism in a media maelstrom in which some journalists mistake virtue-signalling for virtue.
“Artificial intelligence recycles informational infelicities and it is critical that journalistic inputs have integrity, which is why our partnership with OpenAI is so crucial and why we intend to sue AI companies abusing and misusing our trusted journalism.”
Thomson added: “Dow Jones and the New York Post have started proceedings against the perplexing Perplexity, which is selling products based on our journalism, and we are diligently preparing for further action against other companies that have ingested our archives and are synthesising our intellectual property.”