 updated the market on its trading during the first quarter of 2019 on Wednesday, causing shares to fall. ){kind=link}
ITV updated the market on its trading during the first quarter of 2019 on Wednesday, causing shares to fall.
The British broadcaster said that overall performance for the three months to March-end was ‘as expected’, with total revenue down 4% to £743 million.
ITV said that whilst there was a decline in spot advertising due to a later Easter as well as political and economic uncertainty, this was offset by growth in ITV Studios revenue and 22% growth in VOD revenues.
Total revenue at ITV Studios was up 1% at £385 million, compared to £382 million the year before.
Meanwhile, TV Broadcast and Online revenue fell 7% to £489 million, down from £526 million in 2018, amid a 7% fall advertising.
Carolyn McCall, the company’s chief Executive, said that performance had been “very much as we expected”.
Looking ahead, McCall remained optimistic of future growth on the back of the anticipated launch of BritBox and strong growth at ITV Studios.
She said:
“We are making good progress in delivering the strategy and we expect to launch BritBox in the second half of the year. We have also concluded an agreement with a leading ad tech provider, Amobee, which will enable us to deliver programmatic addressable advertising around our premium video inventory on the ITV Hub.
This means ITV can offer the best of both worlds at scale – mass simultaneous reach across linear channels where we delivered 100% of all commercial audiences over 5m, alongside targeted, data-driven addressable advertising in a brand safe environment on the ITV Hub.”
Shares in the company (LON:ITV) are currently down -5.15% as of 10:50AM (GMT).