The New York Times Company (NYSE: NYT) announced today secondquarter 2021 diluted earnings per share from continuing operations of $.32 compared with $.14 in the same period of 2020. Adjusted diluted earnings per share from continuing operations (defined below) was $.36 in the second quarter of 2021 compared with $.18 in the second quarter of 2020.
Operating profit increased to $73.3 million in the second quarter of 2021 from $28.8 million in the same period of 2020 and adjusted operating profit (defined below) increased to $92.9 million from $52.1 million in the prior year, as higher subscription, advertising and other revenues more than offset higher costs.
Meredith Kopit Levien, president and chief executive officer, The New York Times Company, said, “Just after the end of the second quarter, The Times crossed another mile marker on our path to scaling direct, paying subscriber relationships: We now have more than 8 million paid subscriptions across our digital and print products — a testament to the success of our strategy, the strength of the market for paid digital journalism, and our unique opportunity to meet that demand. That milestone follows a second quarter with strong revenue and profit growth and progress on advancing our underlying model.
“We saw moderated growth in net subscription additions in the second quarter, which we expected given that the second quarter is traditionally our softest of the year, and we were comparing against last year’s historic results at the beginning of the Covid crisis. We added 142,000 net digital subscriptions, with 77,000 in News and 65,000 in Cooking and Games. We continue to expect that our total annual net subscription additions will be in the range of 2019, although that remains difficult to predict with precision. And we believe that while the news cycle will continue to have significant effects on our subscription growth, we are increasing our control over the levers of our subscription model.
Total revenues for the second quarter of 2021 increased 23.5 percent to $498.5 million from $403.8 million in the second quarter of 2020. Subscription revenues increased 15.7 percent to $339.2 million, advertising revenues increased 66.4 percent to $112.8 million and other revenues increased 8.7 percent to $46.5 million. Compared with the second quarter of 2019, total revenues increased 14.3 percent, as subscription revenues increased 25.4 percent, advertising revenues declined 6.6 percent and other revenues increased 3.3 percent.
Total operating costs increased 12.4 percent in the second quarter of 2021 to $421.4 million compared with $374.9 million in the second quarter of 2020, while adjusted operating costs increased 15.4 percent to $405.6 million from $351.6 million in the second quarter of 2020. Compared with the second quarter of 2019, total operating costs increased 5.8 percent, while adjusted operating costs increased 6.5 percent.
fuirther detail at: https://s23.q4cdn.com/152113917/files/doc_news/2021/08/Press-Release-6.27.2021-PM-7Xc0A2H$HkQj.pdf