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EMMS > SEC Filings for EMMS > Form 10-Q on 12-Jul-2012All Recent SEC Filings

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Form 10-Q for EMMIS COMMUNICATIONS CORP


12-Jul-2012

Quarterly Report


Item 2. Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations

Note: Certain statements included in this report or in the financial statements contained herein which are not statements of historical fact, including but not limited to those identified with the words "expect," "should," "will" or "look" are intended to be, and are, by this Note, identified as "forward-looking statements," as defined in the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. Such statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause the actual results, performance or achievements of the Company to be materially different from any future result, performance or achievement expressed or implied by such forward-looking statement. Such factors include, among others:

• general economic and business conditions;

• fluctuations in the demand for advertising and demand for different types of advertising media;

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• our ability to service our outstanding debt;

• loss of key personnel;

• increased competition in our markets and the broadcasting industry;

• our ability to attract and secure programming, on-air talent, writers and photographers;

• inability to obtain (or to obtain timely) necessary approvals for purchase or sale transactions or to complete the transactions for other reasons generally beyond our control;

• increases in the costs of programming, including on-air talent;

• new or changing regulations of the Federal Communications Commission or other governmental agencies;

• changes in radio audience measurement methodologies;

• competition from new or different technologies;

• war, terrorist acts or political instability; and

• other factors mentioned in other documents filed by the Company with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

For a more detailed discussion of these and other risk factors, see the Risk Factors section of our Annual Report on Form 10-K, for the year ended February 29, 2012. Emmis does not undertake any obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements because of new information, future events or otherwise.

GENERAL

We are a diversified media company. We own and operate radio and publishing properties located primarily in the United States. Our revenues are mostly affected by the advertising rates our entities charge, as advertising sales represent approximately 70% of our consolidated revenues. These rates are in large part based on our entities' ability to attract audiences/subscribers in demographic groups targeted by their advertisers. Arbitron Inc. generally measures radio station ratings in our domestic markets on a weekly basis using a passive digital system of measuring listening (the Portable People MeterTM). Because audience ratings in a station's local market are critical to the station's financial success, our strategy is to use market research and advertising and promotion to attract and retain audiences in each station's chosen demographic target group.

Our revenues vary throughout the year. As is typical in the broadcasting industry, our revenues and operating income are usually lowest in our fourth fiscal quarter.

In addition to the sale of advertising time for cash, stations typically exchange advertising time for goods or services, which can be used by the station in its business operations. These barter transactions are recorded at the estimated fair value of the product or service received. We generally confine the use of such trade transactions to promotional items or services for which we would otherwise have paid cash. In addition, it is our general policy not to pre-empt advertising spots paid for in cash with advertising spots paid for in trade.

The following table summarizes the sources of our revenues for the three-month periods ended May 31, 2011 and 2012. All revenues generated by our international radio properties are included in the "Local" category. The category "Non Traditional" principally consists of ticket sales and sponsorships of events our stations and magazines conduct in their local markets. The category "Other" includes, among other items, revenues generated by the websites of our entities and barter.

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                                            Three Months Ended May 31,
                                2011       % of Total         2012       % of Total
                                              (Dollars in thousands)
         Net revenues:
         Local                $ 35,166            57.5 %    $ 30,741            54.1 %
         National                9,048            14.8 %       8,180            14.4 %
         Political                 266             0.4 %         863             1.5 %
         Publication Sales       3,444             5.6 %       3,455             6.1 %
         Non Traditional         2,956             4.8 %       3,118             5.5 %
         LMA Fees                1,750             2.9 %       2,611             4.6 %
         Other                   8,516            14.0 %       7,819            13.8 %

         Total net revenues   $ 61,146                      $ 56,787

As previously mentioned, we derive approximately 70% of our net revenues from advertising sales. Our radio stations derive a higher percentage of their advertising revenues from local sales than our publishing entities. In the three-month period ended May 31, 2012, local sales, excluding political revenues, represented approximately 83% and 66% of our advertising revenues for our radio and publishing divisions, respectively.

No customer represents more than 10% of our consolidated net revenues. Our top ten categories for radio represent approximately 61% of our radio division's total advertising net revenues for the three-month periods ended May 31, 2011 and 2012. The automotive industry, representing approximately 11% of our radio net revenues, is the largest category for our radio division for the three-month periods ended May 31, 2011 and 2012, respectively.

The majority of our expenses are fixed in nature, principally consisting of salaries and related employee benefit costs, office and tower rent, utilities, property and casualty insurance and programming-related expenses. However, approximately 20% of our expenses vary in connection with changes in revenues. These variable expenses primarily relate to sales commissions and bad debt reserves. In addition, costs related to our marketing and promotions department are highly discretionary and incurred primarily to maintain and/or increase our audience and market share.

KNOWN TRENDS AND UNCERTAINTIES

Although advertising revenues have stabilized following the recent global recession, domestic radio revenue growth has been challenged for several years. Management believes this is principally the result of three factors: (1) the proliferation of advertising inventory caused by the emergence of new media, such as various media distributed via the Internet, telecommunication companies and cable interconnects, as well as social networks and social coupon sites, all of which are gaining advertising share against radio and other traditional media, (2) the perception of investors and advertisers that satellite radio and portable media players diminish the effectiveness of radio advertising, and
(3) the adoption of a new method of gathering ratings data, which has shown an increase in cumulative audience size, but a decrease in time spent listening as compared to the previous method of gathering ratings data.

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The Company and the radio industry have begun several initiatives to address these issues. The radio industry is working aggressively to increase the number of portable digital media devices that contain an FM tuner, including smartphones and music players. In many countries, FM tuners are common features in portable digital media devices. The radio industry is working with leading United States network providers, device manufacturers, regulators and legislators to ensure that FM tuners are included in future portable digital media devices. Including FM as a feature on these devices has the potential to increase radio listening and improve perception of the radio industry while offering network providers the benefits of a proven emergency notification system, reduced network congestion from audio streaming services, and a host of new revenue generating applications.

The Company has also aggressively worked to harness the power of broadband and mobile media distribution in the development of emerging business opportunities by becoming one of the fifteen largest streaming audio providers in the United States, developing highly interactive websites with content that engages our listeners, using SMS texting and delivering real-time traffic to navigation devices. We have created the Loud Digital Network, which combines our original content with other music and entertainment content to form one of the ten largest music and entertainment networks on the Internet.

Along with the rest of the radio industry, the majority of our stations have deployed HD Radio®. HD Radio® offers listeners advantages over standard analog broadcasts, including improved sound quality and additional digital channels. To make the rollout of HD Radio ® more efficient, a consortium of broadcasters representing a majority of the radio stations in nearly all of our markets have agreed to work together in each radio market to ensure the most diverse consumer offering possible and to accelerate the rollout of HD Radio® receivers, particularly in automobiles. In addition to offering secondary channels, the HD Radio® spectrum allows broadcasters to transmit other forms of data. We are participating in a joint venture with other broadcasters to provide the bandwidth that a third party will use to transmit location-based data to hand-held and in-car navigation devices. It is unclear what impact HD Radio® will have on the markets in which we operate.

The results of our domestic radio operations are heavily dependent on the results of our stations in the New York and Los Angeles markets. These markets account for nearly 50% of our domestic radio net revenues. During fiscal 2012, KPWR-FM in Los Angeles experienced revenue growth that was better than the overall Los Angeles radio market, whereas our New York cluster trailed the revenue performance of the New York market due to weak performance at our adult urban station, WRKS-FM. During the three months ended May 31, 2012, we entered into an LMA for WRKS-FM. See Note 8 to the accompanying condensed consolidated financial statements for more discussion. Our results in New York and Los Angeles are often more volatile than our larger competitors due to our lack of scale in these markets. We are overly dependent on the performance of one station in each of these markets, and as the competitive environment shifts, our ability to adapt is limited. Furthermore, some of our competitors that operate larger station clusters in New York and Los Angeles are able to leverage their market share to extract a greater percentage of available advertising revenue through discounting unit rates.

As part of our business strategy, we continually evaluate potential acquisitions of radio stations, publishing properties and other businesses that we believe hold promise for long-term appreciation in value and leverage our strengths. However, Emmis Operating Company's (the Company's principal operating subsidiary, hereinafter "EOC") Credit Agreement substantially limits our ability to make acquisitions. We also regularly review our portfolio of assets and may opportunistically dispose of assets when we believe it is appropriate to do so.

CRITICAL ACCOUNTING POLICIES

Critical accounting policies are defined as those that encompass significant judgments and uncertainties, and potentially lead to materially different results under different assumptions and conditions. We believe that our critical accounting policies are those described below.

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Revenue Recognition

Broadcasting revenue is recognized as advertisements are aired. Publication revenue is recognized in the month of delivery of the publication. Both broadcasting revenue and publication revenue recognition is subject to meeting certain conditions such as persuasive evidence that an arrangement exists and collection is reasonably assured. LMA fee revenue is recognized on a straight-line basis over the term of the LMA. These criteria are generally met at the time the advertisement is aired for broadcasting revenue and upon delivery of the publication for publication revenue. Advertising revenues presented in the financial statements are reflected on a net basis, after the deduction of advertising agency fees, usually at a rate of 15% of gross revenues.

Allowance for Doubtful Accounts

An allowance for doubtful accounts is recorded based on management's judgment of the collectability of receivables. When assessing the collectability of receivables, management considers, among other things, historical loss experience and existing economic conditions.

FCC Licenses and Goodwill

We have made acquisitions in the past for which a significant amount of the purchase price was allocated to FCC licenses and goodwill assets. As of May 31, 2012, we have recorded approximately $226.2 in goodwill and FCC licenses, which represents approximately 64% of our total assets.

In the case of our U.S. radio stations, we would not be able to operate the properties without the related FCC license for each property. FCC licenses are renewed every eight years; consequently, we continually monitor our stations' compliance with the various regulatory requirements. Historically, all of our FCC licenses have been renewed at the end of their respective periods, and we expect that all FCC licenses will continue to be renewed in the future. We consider our FCC licenses to be indefinite-lived intangibles. Our foreign broadcasting licenses expire during periods ranging from February 2021 to February 2026. While all of our international broadcasting licenses were recently extended, we will need to submit extension applications upon their expiration to continue our broadcast operations in these countries. While there is a general expectancy of renewal of radio broadcast licenses in most countries and we expect to actively seek renewal of our foreign licenses, both of the countries in which we operate do not have the regulatory framework or history that we have with respect to license renewals in the United States. This makes the risk of non-renewal (or of renewal on less favorable terms) of foreign licenses greater than for United States licenses. We treat our foreign broadcasting licenses as definite-lived intangibles and amortize them over their respective license periods.

We do not amortize goodwill or other indefinite-lived intangible assets, but rather test for impairment at least annually or more frequently if events or circumstances indicate that an asset may be impaired. When evaluating our radio broadcasting licenses for impairment, the testing is performed at the unit of accounting level as determined by Accounting Standards Codification ("ASC") Topic 350-30-35. In our case, radio stations in a geographic market cluster are considered a single unit of accounting, provided that they are not being operated under an LMA by another broadcaster.

We complete our annual impairment tests on December 1 of each year and perform additional interim impairment testing whenever triggering events suggest such testing is warranted.

Valuation of Indefinite-lived Broadcasting Licenses

Fair value of our FCC licenses is estimated to be the price that would be received to sell an asset in an orderly transaction between market participants at the measurement date. To determine the fair value of our FCC licenses, the Company uses an income valuation method when it performs its impairment tests. Under this method, the Company projects cash flows that would be generated by each of its units of accounting assuming the unit of accounting was commencing operations in its respective market at the beginning of the valuation period. This cash flow stream is discounted to arrive at a value for the FCC license. The Company assumes the competitive situation that exists in each market remains unchanged, with the exception that its unit of accounting commenced operations at the beginning of the valuation period. In doing so, the Company extracts the value of going concern and any other assets acquired, and strictly values the FCC license. Major assumptions involved in this analysis include market revenue, market revenue growth rates, unit of accounting audience share, unit of accounting revenue share and discount rate. Each of these assumptions may change in the future based upon changes in general economic conditions, audience behavior, consummated transactions, and numerous other variables that may be beyond our control.

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Valuation of Goodwill

ASC Topic 350 requires the Company to test goodwill for impairment at least annually using a two-step process. The first step is a screen for potential impairment, while the second step measures the amount of impairment. The Company conducts the two-step impairment test on December 1 of each fiscal year, unless indications of impairment exist during an interim period. When assessing its goodwill for impairment, the Company uses an enterprise valuation approach to determine the fair value of each of the Company's reporting units (radio stations grouped by market and magazines on an individual basis). Management determines enterprise value for each of its reporting units by multiplying the two-year average station operating income generated by each reporting unit (current year based on actual results and the next year based on budgeted results) by an estimated market multiple. The Company uses a blended station operating income trading multiple of publicly traded radio operators as a benchmark for the multiple it applies to its radio reporting units. There are no publicly traded publishing companies that are focused predominantly on city and regional magazines as is our publishing segment. Therefore, the market multiple used as a benchmark for our publishing reporting units is based on recently completed transactions within the city and regional magazine industry or analyst reports that include valuations of magazine divisions within publicly traded media conglomerates. Management believes this methodology for valuing radio and publishing properties is a common approach and believes that the multiples used in the valuation are reasonable given our peer comparisons and recent market transactions. To corroborate the step-one reporting unit fair values determined using the market approach described above, management also uses an income approach, which is a discounted cash flow method to determine the fair value of the reporting unit.

This enterprise valuation is compared to the carrying value of the reporting unit for the first step of the goodwill impairment test. If the reporting unit exhibits impairment, the Company proceeds to the second step of the goodwill impairment test. For its step-two testing, the enterprise value is allocated among the tangible assets, indefinite-lived intangible assets (FCC licenses valued using a direct-method valuation approach) and unrecognized intangible assets, such as customer lists, with the residual amount representing the implied fair value of the goodwill. To the extent the carrying amount of the goodwill exceeds the implied fair value of the goodwill, the difference is recorded as an impairment charge in the statement of operations.

Deferred Taxes

The Company accounts for income taxes under the asset and liability method, which requires the recognition of deferred tax assets and liabilities for the expected future tax consequence of events that have been recognized in the Company's financial statements or income tax returns. Income taxes are recognized during the year in which the underlying transactions are reflected in the consolidated statements of operations. Deferred taxes are provided for temporary differences between amounts of assets and liabilities as recorded for financial reporting purposes and amounts recorded for income tax purposes. After determining the total amount of deferred tax assets, the Company determines whether it is more likely than not that some portion of the deferred tax assets will not be realized. If the Company determines that a deferred tax asset is not likely to be realized, a valuation allowance will be established against that asset to record it at its expected realizable value.

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Estimate of Effective Tax Rates

We estimate the effective tax rates and associated liabilities or assets for each legal entity within Emmis. These estimates are based upon our interpretation of United States and local tax laws as they apply to our legal entities and our overall tax structure. Audits by local tax jurisdictions, including the United States Government, could yield different interpretations from our own and cause the Company to owe more taxes than originally recorded. We utilize advisors in the various tax jurisdictions to evaluate our position and to assist in our calculation of our tax expense and related assets and liabilities.

Results of Operations for the Three-month Periods Ended May 31, 2012, Compared to May 31, 2011

Net revenues:

                                         For the three months ended May 31,
                                           2011                      2012              $ Change          % Change
                                                 (As reported, amounts in thousands)
Net revenues:
Radio                                $          45,370         $          40,376       $  (4,994 )           (11.0 )%
Publishing                                      15,776                    16,411             635               4.0 %

Total net revenues                   $          61,146         $          56,787       $  (4,359 )            (7.1 )%

Radio net revenues decreased in the three-month period ended May 31, 2012 as compared to the same period of the prior year principally due to the July 15, 2011 commencement of a Local Marketing Agreement ("LMA") related to the Merlin Stations and the ultimate sale of a controlling interest in these stations on September 1, 2011. As Emmis retained a noncontrolling equity ownership in the Merlin Stations, they have not been classified as discontinued operations. Excluding the Merlin Stations, radio net revenues would have increased $0.7 million or 1.8%. We typically monitor the performance of our domestic stations against the aggregate performance of the markets in which we operate based on reports for the periods prepared by Miller Kaplan. Miller Kaplan reports are generally prepared on a gross revenues basis and exclude revenues from barter arrangements. Miller Kaplan information through May 2012 is not yet available. The following discussion of year-to-date results is for the two months ended April 2012. Miller Kaplan reported gross revenues for our domestic radio markets decreased 5.0% for the two-month period ended April 30, 2012 as compared to the same period of the prior year. Excluding the Merlin Stations, our gross revenues as reported to Miller Kaplan decreased 2.2% for the two-month period ended April 30, 2012 as compared to the same period of the prior year. For the two-month period ending April 30, 2012, our gross revenues exceeded the market average in New York, Los Angeles and Indianapolis, but trailed market performance in St. Louis and Austin. Miller Kaplan does not report gross revenue market data for our Terre Haute market. For the three-month period ended May 31, 2012 as compared to the same period of the prior year, our average rate per minute for our domestic radio stations was down 2.9%, and our minutes sold were up 4.9%.

Publishing net revenues increased in the three-month period ended May 31, 2012 as compared to the same period of the prior year mostly due to performance of our Texas Monthly and Los Angeles Magazine publications. While these publications saw improvement in advertising demand, the advertising market for our smaller market publications remains challenged.

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Station operating expenses excluding depreciation and amortization expense:

                                          For the three months ended May 31,
                                            2011                      2012              $ Change          % Change
                                                  (As reported, amounts in thousands)
Station operating expenses
excluding depreciation and
amortization expense:
Radio                                 $          32,988         $          30,600       $  (2,388 )            (7.2 )%
Publishing                                       16,346                    16,244            (102 )            (0.6 )%

Total station operating expenses
excluding depreciation and
amortization expense                  $          49,334         $          46,844       $  (2,490 )            (5.0 )%

Station operating expenses, excluding depreciation and amortization expense for the three-month periods ended May 31, 2012 were significantly affected by the LMA of the Merlin Stations in the prior year and the LMA of 98.7FM in the current year. In connection with the LMA of 98.7FM, the Company incurred approximately $3.2 million of costs, predominately related to contract termination payments and severance costs. Also, as Emmis retained a noncontrolling equity interest in the Merlin Stations, the results of those stations are included in continuing operations in the prior year. Station operating expenses excluding depreciation and amortization expense for the Merlin Stations in the prior year were $5.2 million. Excluding these items, radio station operating expenses, excluding depreciation and amortization expense for the three-month period ending May 31, 2012 would have decreased $0.4 million or 1.6% as compared to the same period of the prior year.

Station operating expenses excluding depreciation and amortization expense for publishing for the three-month period ended May 31, 2012 remained flat as publications continue to control costs in light of weak advertising demand.

Corporate expenses excluding depreciation and amortization expense:

                                        For the three months ended May 31,
                                          2011                      2012              $ Change          % Change
                                                (As reported, amounts in thousands)
Corporate expenses excluding
depreciation and amortization
expense                             $           7,335         $           4,972       $  (2,363 )           (32.2 )%

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