ProSiebenSat.1 adjusts expectations downward in ‘difficult environment’

Germany’s ProSiebenSat.1’s second quarter revenues have edged above the €2 billion level for the first time in the first half of a year, in what the company admitted was a difficult market environment.

That difficult environment led to a downward adjustment in the group’s EBITDA forecast for the full year. ProSiebenSat.1 now expects adjusted EBITDA of about €805 million for the year, compared with €833 million previously, including the disposal of Red Arrow Studios’ US business.

For the second quarter, revenues grew by about 1% to take the total to €1.055 billion, while adjusted EBITDA was stable at €166 million.

ProSiebenSat.1 continued to refocus its business on the German-speaking markets with the ‘strategic divestments’ of Red Arrow Studios, US operations.

The group’s dating and video revenues and commerce and ventures activities grew strongly. The core entertainment bsiness recorded growth of 2% on the other hand, with ad revenues downslightly

The company said the numbers wre affected by particularly strong previous-year figures, when ProSiebenSat.1 benefitted from a bounceback from the pandemic.

“Our revenue development in the second quarter proves once again that, thanks to our diversified set-up, we are more crisis-proof than many other media companies. We were thus able to continue our growth as a Group despite difficult economic conditions. This was not only driven by our Entertainment segment, but also by the Commerce & Ventures business,” said CEO Rainer Beaujean.

“Thereby, ProSiebenSat.1 also generated for the first-time revenues of more than €2 billion in a first half of the year. At the same time, we are clearly focusing on synergies to create value in the long- term. The disposal of Red Arrow Studios’ US production business was the next milestone to position our Group in a more focused way and more profitably in the long-term. We are closely monitoring the economic uncertainties in our environment – we have reviewed our outlook accordingly and updated our forecast to reflect the most recent portfolio measures. Overall, we remain confident for the second half of 2022.”