OREANDA-NEWS. Net income of CTC Media for 3Q by US GAAP rose by over two times versus the similar period of past year, forming a total of 17.4 mn USD, Veles Capital informs with reference to CTC-Media press-service. Sales of the company rose +33%, reaching 94.1 mn USD, OIBDA +68% to 32 mn USD. Third quarter is traditionally the least successful for the company. Sales of CTC dropped by 16%, in particular. However, the most serious fall was demonstrated by segments of TV stations, not the CTC and Domashny channels. Share of CTC channel’s viewers continues to drop for over half a year. Only over 1Q some slight growth occurred, but then it dropped again. Versus 3Q 2006 this value lost 1.4 p.p., falling back to 8.7%. Apart from this, Domashny channel which had stable growth of viewers, lost its positions over the past quarter (0.1 p.p. versus 2Q 2007, current value equals 1.9% now). Quarter’s results comprise a decrease of EBITDA margin by over 14 p.p. However, in the view of experts, 3Q 2006 was much worse (drop of effectiveness amounted to 26.6 p.p.) due to toughened legislation regarding length of TV commercials.

In addition to the published report, CTC-Media’s management dropped its upper target estimate of financials for full 2007. Sales are now expected at 460-480 mn USD (previous value of 460-500 mn USD), EBITDA margin - 45-47% (previous value - 45-48%).