I love being a cheapskate. Oh, sure, sometimes it comes at the cost of angry emails from readers saying, in effect, "What do you mean 30 times forward sales is expensive? This <insert momentum stock of the day> one is going to the moon!"
But when it comes to actually running my own money, it has kept me solidly in the black for many years running and helped me to avoid situations like EW Scripps (NYSE:SSP) -- situations where I like the company just fine but am not so confident on valuation. With apologies to Scripps shareholders, this story keeps developing the way I like. The stock has slid a further 15% from a year ago, but the business continues to develop nicely.
For this quarter, revenues rose a further 12% on a pro forma basis and about 19% on a reported basis. Top-line growth continues to be fueled by solid performance at the network operations and excellent growth in the interactive/online businesses. As for the newspaper and TV station units -- well, at least they're growing.
Profitability is a little more dicey. Charges and such gunk up the easy comparisons, though the company reported that income from continuing operations was up 2% and that segment profits from continuing operations rose about 13%. All in all, I can live with that.
I also kinda like the fact that Scripps is so often lumped in with Tribune (NYSE:TRB), Gannett (NYSE:GCI) and the likes in discussions of the dreary environment for newspapers. Yeah, newspapers are dreary, but profits in the network business are growing at a 20% clip and the interactive business is also profitable and growing. In other words, as time rolls on, the newspapers get less important to the whole.
As a one-time fan of the Food Network, I am a little concerned about that network and its growth prospects. As it strikes my jaundiced eye, there hasn't been a real new hit show or star there in a long, long time (apart, perhaps, from uber-perky Rachael Ray). But with the HGTV network now doing better, maybe more executive attention is on the way.
These shares are finally at that point where I want to sharpen the pencils and really dig into the numbers and my valuation model. Now, that might ultimately mean that I'm too optimistic, but I think it's at least worth further exploration by those who believe media isn't quite dead yet.
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Fool contributor Stephen Simpson has no financial interest in any stocks mentioned (that means he's neither long nor short the shares).
