Sinclair Fourth Quarter Revenues, Income Fall With Decline In Political Ad Sales

Dividend

SINCLAIR BROADCAST GROUP fourth quarter 2015 total revenues fell 0.3% to $611.8 million, blamed on the absence of $68.5 million in political revenues in a non-election year.   Net income fell from $95.4 million to $58.2 million (98 to 61 cents/diluted share).  Results for the company's radio stations in the SEATTLE market are not broken out in the report.

"SINCLAIR continues to introduce industry-leading initiatives that expand our viewing and advertising platforms. Most notable, we are creating low-cost original programming, adding unique news content, launching various network platforms, and expanding our digital strategies on multiple devices," said President/CEO DAVID SMITH. "We continue to advocate for regulatory reform to allow broadcast television to compete on a level playing field with other forms of media, and we are making great strides on behalf of the industry to bring the Next Generation Broadcast Platform and its many potential business use cases to the consumer."

"We expect 2016 to be another record-breaking financial year due to expected significant political advertising spending in the Presidential election year, growth in our digital sales offerings, and higher retransmission revenues on 60% subscriber renewals, of which we have already entered into agreements-in-principle on most," added EVP/COO DAVID AMY.  "Our operating focus in 2016 will be on launching CIRCA (the online news aggregator), securing approval for the Next Generation Broadcast Platform (ATSC 3.0), expanding our network distribution platforms and monetizing our digital content management system."

The company's Board of Directors also declared a quarterly cash dividend of $0.165 per share on the Company's Class A and Class B common stock.  The dividend is payable on MARCH 18th to shareholders of record as of MARCH 7th.

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