👉 Background: Nine Entertainment is the media company behind a whole heap of major Australian brands. We're talking:

• Channel Nine
• The Australian Financial Review, The Age and Sydney Morning Herald
• 3AW and 2GB
• Stan

👉 What happened: The past 12 months have been tough for Nine Entertainment. Their revenue remained steady at $2.7 billion, but they had some major costs to swallow... like an $85 million write down to its radio licenses, and other assets too.

👉 What else: On top of that, the ad market for free-to-air slots dropped further than the Ninja Warrior ratings. All in all, Nine Entertainment saw a 38% drop it net profit. But, Nine aren't the only ones facing a very tricky advertising market in this economy.

What's the key learning?

💡The advertising market is often referred to as one of the "leading economic indicators".

💡In periods of economic growth, businesses often expand their advertising spend to reach new audiences and customers. This usually leads to a higher volume of ads at higher ad rates. But on the flip side, in times of economy slowdown, advertising budgets are often the first to be cut.

💡Nine has seen its free-to-air ad market drop more than 11% year on year. But it ain't just them:

• ARN, the radio network behind KISS FM and Gold FM, has seen its EBITDA drop 27%
• Nine's arch rival, Seven West Media, saw net profit drop 31%
• Chuck in a 20% drop in Southern Cross Austereo's net profit and it's not a good time to be a major media network...

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