The New York Times added 300,000 digital subscribers in the second fiscal quarter of 2024, marking a 12.9% increase in digital subscription revenue year-over-year to $304.5 million. The increase was driven largely by bundle and multiproduct subscriber additions, the company said as it announced earnings on Wednesday.
Here are the top-line results:
Revenue: $625.1 million, up 5.8% from $590.9 million in 2023.
Earnings: Diluted earnings per share is $0.40.
Subscribers: The New York Times added 300,000 digital subscribers in the quarter to bring the digital subscriber total to 10.2 million. Total subscribers reached 10.84 million in the quarter.
“Our subscribers were deeply engaged in Q2,” president and CEO of the Times Meredith Kopit Levien said during Wednesday’s shareholders call. “We saw the share of subscribers on our site and apps each week hit another multi-year high. That’s a clear sign that we’re delivering unique value to users, and building long-term relationships.”
“We’re showing that we can sustainably translate that interest into more direct relationships, more subscribers, growing revenue and increasing profitability, even as the market continues to experience significant audience headwinds driven by ship in the platform landscape halfway through 2024,” Levien added.
Total advertising revenues for the Times increased 1.2% to $119.2. Print advertising revenues, which decreased 10% in the quarter, were partially offset by 7.8% growth in digital advertising revenues, or $79.6 million. Digital advertising revenue increases were attributed to higher revenues from display advertising at both The Athletic and NYTG.
The Athletic, which was acquired by the Times in 2022 for $550 million, saw revenues grow 33.4% year-over-year in the quarter to $40.5 million. Subscription revenues increased 19.4% to $29.3 million, primarily attributed to subscription growth and the ability to bundle. Advertising revenues for The Athletic grew 30% to $7.1 million.
“It was a strong second quarter for The Times – one in which we made further progress on the path to grow our subscriber base and become the essential subscription for every curious person seeking to understand and engage with the world,” Levien said. “The combination of our world-class news destination plus market-leading lifestyle products means we have complementary offerings in big spaces, each with multiple growth levers fueling multiple revenue streams. Together we believe these make The Times resilient in a changing media landscape and well positioned for continued value creation.”
The New York Times filed an ambitious lawsuit in December against Microsoft and OpenAI, accusing the tech giants of copyright infringement. The Times’ lawsuit marked the first blockbuster case from news publishers over generative AI capabilities and how chatbots were trained, as the technology embeds itself in the media industry.
In the second quarter, the Times said it spent $2.0 million of pre-tax litigation-related costs on the lawsuit.
In the first quarter of 2024, the Times said it spent $1 million on the OpenAI and Microsoft lawsuit. Both Microsoft and OpenAI have sought to dismiss key elements of the lawsuit.
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