RTL Group Reports Record Earnings

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LUXEMBOURG: RTL Group’s revenue increased 3.4 percent to €6.2 billion ($6.57 billion) for the full-year 2016, with operating profits reaching a record high of €1.2 billion ($1.27 billion), up 3.3 percent.

This marks the fifth consecutive year that RTL has delivered a record profit.

RTL Group’s three largest business units—Mediengruppe RTL Deutschland, Groupe M6 and FremantleMedia—delivered significantly higher profit contributions. Mediengruppe RTL Deutschland closed the year with record results: EBITA grew by 3.1 percent to €705 million ($745 million), resulting in an outstanding EBITA margin of 31.8 percent. Groupe M6 also reached a record EBITA, of €252 million ($266 million). FremantleMedia’s EBITA increased by 6.8 percent to €110 million ($116 million), reflecting higher profit contributions from content coming through the pipeline as a result of recent acquisitions and investments.

RTL Group expects its total revenue for the fiscal year 2017 to continue to grow moderately, up by 2.5 percent to 5 percent.

Anke Schäferkordt and Guillaume de Posch, co-CEOs of RTL Group, said: “2016 was another record year for RTL Group. We continued our growth track, with both revenue and EBITA at an all-time high, and at the same time, our three most important business units—Mediengruppe RTL Deutschland, Groupe M6 and FremantleMedia—reported higher operating profits. Mediengruppe RTL Deutschland generated a record profit for the fifth consecutive year, exceeding the level of €700 million for the first time. Groupe M6 profited from a positive one-off effect financially and from the Uefa Euro 2016 in terms of audience shares. We are a very cash-generative business, giving us all financial means for both—further investments and attractive dividend payments to our shareholders.

“While we currently review our options for BroadbandTV, this does not change our overall strategy—broadcast, content, digital—which focuses on two main investment goals. One is to further expand and develop our digital businesses where global scale in content aggregation and advertising technology becomes ever more important. This is paying off: our digital businesses continued to grow dynamically and we already reached our target that 10 percent of the Group’s total revenue originate from digital.

“The other investment goal is to further grow content production. FremantleMedia is making sound progress with its push into high-end drama. Following the premiere of The Young Pope in October 2016, we are looking forward to seeing American Gods going on air in spring. In a ground-breaking deal with Amazon, we were also able to bring this extraordinary series to viewers worldwide, thanks to the close collaboration between the production and distribution business of FremantleMedia. Exclusive content like this is the power engine for everything we do in the total video universe.”