Dow Jones profits up sharply

NEW YORK (AP) — Financial news publisher Dow Jones & Co. reported a jump in third-quarter earnings as advertising rose sharply at The Wall Street Journal in September. 

The company called the 29 percent gain in the Journal's advertising volume last month a hopeful sign, but stopped short of declaring an end to a long and severe downturn in financial and technology advertising. 

Dow Jones reported net earnings of $9.1 million, or 11 cents per share, in the three months ending Sept. 30, compared with $2.4 million, or 3 cents per share, in the period a year ago. 

Excluding one-time charges, the company earned $11.4 million, or 14 cents a share, in the most recent quarter, up from $5.3 million, or 6 cents a share, a year ago. The latest results were well ahead of the 11 cents that analysts surveyed by Thomson First Call had been expecting. 

Revenues rose 7 percent in the quarter to $375.9 million from $352.4 million. 

Chairman and CEO Peter Kann said the company was "very pleased" with the rise in September linage at the Journal. "While we're not ready to call an end to this severe (business-to-business) ad recession, we are cautiously optimistic that the worst is now behind us." 

Speaking with analysts on a conference call, chief operating officer Richard Zannino said that despite the strong showing in September, the company remained cautious about the outlook for the fourth quarter given the difficulty of predicting ad spending. 

He said the strong September linage results were partially due to some extra publishing days in the cycle compared to a year ago and to one major ad campaign. He said the company expected low to mid-single digit growth in Journal advertising for the fourth quarter. 

In addition to the Journal, Dow Jones publishes Barron's, Dow Jones Newswires and owns half of SmartMoney magazine together with Hearst Corp.