News Corp beats Wall Street revenue estimates
The multimedia group, which owns The Times, The Sunday Times and The Sun as well as The Wall Street Journal, the New York Post and The Australian, said overall revenue for the three months to the end of June was $2.11 billion, compared with consensus analysts' estimates of $2.09 billion, according to data compiled by FactSet.
The Dow Jones division, which includes The Wall Street Journal, Barron's, MarketWatch and Investor's Business Daily, reported a 6.7 per cent rise in quarterly revenue to $604 million, as it benefited from higher digital subscriptions.
Dow Jones revenue was also boosted by higher circulation and subscription revenues from its professional information business, offering regulatory, compliance and business intelligence products.
Revenues from digital real estate services increased 4 per cent to $466 million, driven by higher revenues at REA Group, which operates Australia's leading real estate websites.
The rise in group revenue was partly offset by lower revenues at the company's news media division, which fell 4 per cent to $545 million.
The company's book publishing unit, which owns HarperCollins, saw its revenue fall 4 per cent to $494 million owing to a slowdown in consumer spending and a weaker selection of new titles.
Overall net income from continuing operations in the quarter was $86 million, a 28 per cent increase compared with the same period a year ago.
News Corp signed a multi-year agreement last year to bring news content from its publications to OpenAI.
Robert Thomson, chief executive of News Corp, warned that the 'AI age must cherish the value of intellectual property if we are collectively to realise our potential'.
He added: 'Much is made of the competition with China, but America's advantage is ingenuity and creativity, not bits and bytes, not watts but wit. To undermine that comparative advantage by stripping away IP rights is to vandalise our virtuosity'.
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