News in the publishing world. At the meeting of Gedi (the publishing companies of La Repubblica, L'Espresso, La Stampa and il Secolo XIX) the CEO Monica Mondardini announced that she will leave her post at the helm of the newspapers after 9 years, confirming the rumors circulated. She will remain vice president along with John Elkan. Marco De Benedetti, while the assembly of the publishing group is underway, proposed Laura Cioli as the new CEO.
“I remain involved – added Mondardini – in Gedi's future in my capacity as CEO of Cir and director of the company. These have been very challenging years, due to the challenges that the sector has faced and will continue to face. Gedi has been able to anticipate developments and react in the most appropriate way: it is the only group that has always recorded positive economic results, from 2008 to 2016 it canceled its debt, which then amounted to 280 million euros, it invested in digital, in which he is a pioneer and leader, he carried out the first major publishing aggregation operation in the last decade”.
On the day of the assembly, Gedi also presented the quarterly which closes with a consolidated net result of 3 million, against a profit of €5,0 million in the first quarter of 2017 (€5,8 million on a like-for-like basis). In fact, the company recalls that in the first quarter of 2017 the integration with the Itedi Group (La Stampa and Secolo XIX) had not yet taken place and therefore the change compared to the first three months of 2017 on a like-for-like basis is also provided for the main economic indicators .
Consolidated revenues, equal to 155,8 million, they increased by 20,7% compared to the first quarter of 2017 (-5,8% on a like-for-like basis). Circulation revenue, equal to 71,7 million, grew by 33,0% compared to the corresponding period of the previous year and decreased by 7,5% on a like-for-like basis, in a market that recorded a reduction in 8,5% of newspaper circulation. Advertising revenues grew by 14,3% and decreased by 3,1% on a like-for-like basis. Costs are 24,9% higher than in the first quarter of 2017 and are down 3,2% on a like-for-like basis; both fixed personnel costs (-1,9%) and other costs (-4,0%) decreased
The consolidated gross operating margin amounted to 11,4 million, compared to 13 million in the first quarter of 2017.
The RCS shareholders' meeting also took place today during which Urbano Cairo, president and managing director of RCS Media Group (Corriere della Sera) gave some advances on the accounts for the quarter. “I can't say anything, because we have the board of directors convened for next May 9, but it will be a good quarterly,” he said. “The goal – he added – is to distribute a dividend, possibly next year. I'm not saying there will be, it is the shareholders' meeting that decides, but we are working to be able to give a dividend and we hope to do so”. Finally, Cairo ruled out a possible merger between RCS Media Group and Cairo Communication: “It's not on the agenda right now. In general we are not thinking about this issue, we don't see great elements of benefit from a merger, but we can always reconsider".
