Playboy’s third quarter results were better than the company or Wall Street expected thanks, in part, to a strong performance from its digital business. Profit plunged 69 percent to $1 million, or 3 cents per share, compared with $3.2 million, or 10 cents, a year earlier. Sales rose 2 percent to $82.3 million. Analysts had expected a loss of 3 cents on revenue of $79.4 million, according to Thomson Financial. Online subscription and e-commerce revenue rose 41 percent to $12.6 million from $9 million. Some of those gains may be attributed to Playboy’s purchase in June of Club Jenna, the company founded by adult film queen Jenna Jameson.  Otherwise, the results weren’t that great. CEO Christie Hefner said in the earnings release that the domestic TV business “remains in transition” and publishing remains “challenging.”
Some details:
-- Profit in the Entertainment Group was hurt by a planned increase in online expenses, which pushed up programming and content expense by 12 percent. The unit’s profit was $5.8 million, down 18 percent from a year earlier, while revenue rose 5 percent to $50.2 million.
-- Publishing lost $800,000 in the quarter, while revenue declined 9.9 percent to $24.6 million. The company expects advertising revenues to be up approximately 10 percent in this quarter but doesn’t specify how much of that is coming from online versus print.
Earnings release| Conference Call (11 am)